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solarwriting · 3 years

Text

good 4 u

e.j. caswell (formerly) x fem!reader

summary: after a bad break up, y/n writes a song and plays it with her band at a party her ex is also at.

warnings: swearing, underage drinking, unedited and written at one a.m.

note: i don’t know what this is but the song is so good and i watched the first ep of season two and this was born?? if you want a pronoun change let me know!

posted may 17, 2021

it seemed as soon as he broke up with nini e.j. found a new girl to entertain him. y/n l/n, she wasn’t a part of the musical. it wasn’t her lack of talent so much as it was a lack of interest, she figured focusing on her own music and starting a band would make her seem more serious.

she was pinning a band tryouts flier to the bulletin board in the cafeteria, unaware of the eyes on her. almost the entire cast of the musical was staring at her. nini sighed, “guys, stop. she’s gonna notice us staring.”

“do you think she knows what happened with you guys.” carlos asked, turning back to face her, leaning in to hear her answer.

“no. i don’t know. i shouldn’t care, it’s just- whatever.” she groaned, pushing her food around with her fork.

“convincing.” seb commented.

“i know he’s my cousin but honestly e.j.’s a bit of a whore.” ashlyn muttered causing the table to laugh.

kourtney leaned into nini’s shoulder, “let’s give y/n the benefit of the doubt and say she has no idea?”

“i mean how could she? she’s not part of the musical, she focused on her band.” ashlyn explained.

“wait, she has a band?” carlos asked.

“she’s starting one, she plays guitar and drums but she wanted a drummer another guitar and singer. i think that’s what she was putting on the board.” ashlyn shrugged, everyone looked at her confused, “what? we used to hang out.”

“wait, really?” nini wondered.

“yeah, she’s actually really nice. and really talented, girl can really shred. you guys would really getting along, you know if you forget about my stupid cousin.”

nini laughed along with the group, her eyes fell back to y/n who was now sitting with e.j. and his friends. maybe they could be friends.

it turns out e.j. is really bad with girlfriends because it only took a few weeks for them to break up, no one could really figure out why though just that y/n left school wednesday crying and didn’t come back until the following monday.

a few days later y/n caught her on her way to rehearsals for the musical, “hey, nini. can i ask you something?”

“yeah, sure.” nini was hesitant but thought on what ashlyn said.

“so you write songs right?” nini nodded and y/n continued, “so i’m writing this song for my band and i was wondering if you could give me some pointers. i know you probably won’t want to because of e.j. actually forget i asked, it was stupid.”

y/n turned to walk away before nini stopped her, “y/n wait. i can help you, come on.”

“where are we going?”

“i have to go to rehearsal and since they’re not doing any gabriella scenes we can work on it in the auditorium.” she motioned for the girl to follow her.

“hi, miss jenn. this is y/n, is it okay if we sit over there while you’re going over the scenes i’m not in?”

“of course. nice to meet you y/n.” miss jenn smiled.

they sat a few rows back, behind miss jenn and y/n pulled out a notebook, “it’s really rough right now. and it’s kind of embarrassing but you can look at it.”

nini was quiet as she read over the lyrics she had written down. “is the about?”

“yes.” y/n said quickly, “sorry if that’s weird.”

“no it’s okay, i actually really like it.”

“i was just really angry when he ended it- and did you know he’s already seeing someone else?”

“really? it hasn’t even been a week!”

“i know! she’s a cheerleader i guess.”

“and here i thought his type was musicans.”

“right? from what i’ve heard they’ve been off and on since his sophomore year and they started hooking up again while he was still seeing me.”

“i guess ashyln was right about her whore statement.”

y/n laughed and they continued to work on the song together. by the end of rehearsal everyone was talking about how two of e.j.’s exes had created a bond, at one point e.j. himself noticed the pair and looked like he was going to be sick. the girls finished the song and were getting ready to leave.

“hey, would you actually like to join my band, i need another singer and your voice is killer. we’re playing a party tomorrow night.”

“i would love to, will this song be on this set?” she asked.

“of course, imagine e.j.’s face when he sees two of his exes singing about him.” y/n laughed.

the two girls left and later that evening nini met the rest of the band (y/n managed to find a drummer and bassist a week ago) and practiced their new song as well as a couple of covers for the party.

the next evening, which was a friday, the band found themselves at the party. y/n couldn’t remember the name of whose house they were at though, a friend of a friend who offered her band to play.

y/n passed around shots of tequila to her bandmates “for the nerves” she had put it before downing hers with a groan. the rest followed suit before they made their way in to the basement, where the main part of the party was and where their instruments were set up. y/n pulled her guitar off the stand and plugged it in, she grabbed the microphone and adjusted it.

“hi, i’m y/n and first song i want to sing is an original written by myself and the amazing nini.” y/n motioned to nini who stood next to her, “this song is for anyone whose ever gone through a breakup where their ex got off better than they did, this is good 4 u, enjoy!”

y/n nodded to the bassist who began playing and nini started in with the first verse with y/n doing back up vocals,

“well good for you, i guess you moved on really easily

you found a new girl and it only took a couple weeks

remember when you said that you wanted to give me the world”

y/n leaned into the mic and continued with the next line,

“and good for you, i guess that you've been working on yourself

i guess that therapist i found for you, she really helped

now you can be a better man for your brand new girl”

the drummers began playing and y/n began strumming her guitar and nini leaned into their shared mic as they both sang the chorus,

“well good for you

you look happy and healthy, not me

if you ever cared to ask

good for you”

y/n and nini smiled at each other as they continued,

“you're doing great out there without me, baby

god, i wish that i could do that

i’ve lost my mind

i’ve spent the night

crying on the floor of my bathroom

but you're so unaffected, i really don't get it

but I guess good for you”

y/n took the next verse and nini did the back up vocals. y/n joined nini to sing,

“baby what the fuck is up with that?

nini continued the next verse on her own with y/n joining in on the chorus again. y/n sang the bridge on her own before they both sang the chorus. they both found e.j. in the crowd as they sang. the girls smiled at one another before locking eyes with the boy to finish out their song,

“well, good for you, i guess you moved on really easily”

the crowd of excited, drunk teenagers cheered as the song ended. “i hope you all liked that!” y/n announced, out of breath. she looked at nini who was smiling just as widely as she was. she pulled the girl into a hug (being mindful if the guitar hanging around her). they bowed and nini grabbed the mic, “we will be taking a short break but we will be back!”

the band shared a group hug before breaking apart to find a drink or friends. carlos, ashlyn, and kortney quickly found nini who was with y/n looking for water. “that was amazing!” carlos squealed, pulling nini in for a hug followed by the two girls.

“y/n, that was incredible!” ashlyn gushed, hugging her as well, “i’ve missed hanging out with you so much!”

“i have too!” y/n exclaimed.

“hate to interrupt but can we please go find some water?” nini shouted over the music someone put on. y/n nodded and threw her arm over nini’s shoulder before they began their search.

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jayoctodot · 3 years

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The Silent Patient vs The Maidens

I will start by saying that I understand the appeal of these novels as page-turners. They are easy to read and if you want a twisty reveal at the end, you will probably be entertained and satisfied. That being said, I am SO CONFUSED by the near-universal adoration of The Silent Patient and the reasonably positive reception of The Maidens. The weaknesses of the two are strikingly similar, as well, which doesn’t give me much hope of seeing improvement from this guy, though I am intrigued to see whether he keeps repeating the same (apparently successful!!) patterns. These books were at least super fun to hate.

(For context, I read The Maidens for a bookclub I'm in, because several of the members had read and loved The Silent Patient, and one of them gave me a copy of the latter to read on my own time. I loathed The Maidens and then read The SP for comparative purposes. And because I'm a masochist, apparently.)

SPOILER WARNING! Do not read on unless you've finished both books (or unless you care not for spoilers). Sorry if it gets a bit shouty.

Here are the similar weaknesses I noticed in both:

PSEUDO-PSYCHOLOGY

-> Weirdly similar “group therapy” scenes early on where a cartoonishly unstable patient arrives late, disrupts the meeting by throwing something into the middle of the circle, and is asked to join the group after the therapist(s) speechify on the importance of boundaries (HA! None of these therapists would know an appropriate boundary if it kicked them in the ass) and debate whether to “allow” the patient to join. Both scenes are so transparent in their design to establish the credibility/legitimacy of the narrators as therapists, but instead both Theo and Mariana come off as super patronizing. The protagonists are less and less believable as therapists at the stories progress (though at least Theo’s incompetence is explained away by the “twist” at the end; Mariana, on the other hand, is confronted in the opening pages of the novel by a patient who has self-harmed PRETTY extensively, and rather than ensure he get proper medical attention, she essentially throws him a first aid kit and tosses him out the door so she can pour herself a glass of wine and call her niece... and it devolves from there).

-> Ongoing insistence throughout the narrative that one’s childhood trauma entirely explains the warped/dysfunctional way a character behaves or views the world, which is why the books go out of their way to give EVERY potentially violent character a traumatic childhood; when Theo insists that no one ever became an abuser who hadn’t been abused themselves, I wanted to throw the book across the room. (That is a MYTH, SIR. GET OUT OF HERE WITH YOUR ARMCHAIR PSYCHOLOGY.)

-> Female murderers whose pathology boils down to “history of depression” and “traumatized by a male loved one/family member.” Because, as we all know, depression + abuse = murderer!

-> The “therapy” depicted in both books is laughable and so so unrealistic, mostly because neither narrators function as therapists so much as incompetent detectives, obsessively pursuing a case they have no place pursuing (or skill to pursue - both just happen across every clue mostly by way of clunky conversation with all the people who can provide precisely the snippet of info to send them along to the next person, and the next… until all is revealed in a tired, cliched “twist”). Their constant Psych 101 asides were so tiresome and weirdly dated (also, the constant harping on countertransference got so ridiculous that at one point during "therapy" Theo literally attributes his headache and a particular emotion he feels to Alicia, as though the contents of her head are being broadcast directly into his mind... and I'm PRETTY SURE that's not how it works???)

CHARACTERS

-> Psychotherapist narrators with abusive fathers and pretensions of being Sherlock Holmes, which results in both characters crossing ALL KINDS of ethical lines as they invade the personal lives of everyone even tangentially connected to their cases (and, in Theo's case, violate all kinds of patient confidentiality. Yeah, yeah, by the end, that's the least of his offenses, but before you get there, it's baffling that NO ONE is calling him out on this).

-> All female characters are either elderly with hilariously bad advice, monstrous hulking brutes, or beautiful bitches (except for ~MARIANA~, who is Bella Swan-esque in her unawareness of her own attractiveness, despite multiple men trying to get with her almost immediately after meeting her. I'm so tired of beautiful female characters being oblivious to their own hotness. Are we meant to believe all mirrors and male attention have escaped their notice? If it’s to make them “relatable,” this tactic really fails with me).

-> All characters of color are shallow, cartoonish side characters, and most of them are depicted as unsympathetic minor antagonists (the Sikh Chief Inspector in The Maidens continuously drinks tea from an ever-present thermos, and his only other notable characteristic is his instant dislike of Mariana, whom he VERY RIGHTLY warns to stay out of the investigation that she is VERY MUCH compromising… the Caribbean manager of the Grove is universally disliked by her staff for enforcing stricter safety regulations at the bafflingly poorly run mental institution, because HOW DARE SHE. There's a very clear vibe that we're supposed to dislike these characters and share the protagonists' indignation, but honestly Sangha/Stephanie were completely in the right for trying to shut down their wildly inappropriate investigations).

-> "Working class" characters (or basically anyone excluded from the comfortably upper-crust, educated main cadre of characters) are few and far between in both stories, but when they show up, he depicts them as such caricatures. We got Elsie the pathologically lying housekeeper in the Maidens, who is enticed to share her bullshit with cake, and then a TOOTHLESS LEPRECHAUN DEALING DRUGS UNDER A BRIDGE in the SP. I kid you not, a man described as having the body of a child, the face of Father Time, and no front teeth, emerges from beneath a bridge and offers to sell Theo some "grass." I was dyinggg.

-> There are no characters to root for. Anywhere. Partly because they’re all so thinly drawn — and because we’re clearly supposed to view almost ALL of them as potential suspects, so they’re ALL weird, creepy, or incompetent in some way.

-> The flimsiest of flimsy motives, both for the narrators and the murderers. Theo fully would have gotten away with his involvement in the murder if he hadn't gone out of his way to work at the Grove and "treat" Alicia and his justification for doing so is pretty weak; his rapid descent into stalking and murder fantasy and his random ass decision to "expose" Alicia's husband as a cheater with a spur-of-the-moment home invasion and staged attempted homicide is ONLY justified if the reader hand waves it away as WELP, HE'S CRAZY, I GUESS (after all, he DID have an abusive father and a history of mental illness, and in Michaelides novels, that's ALL YOU NEED to become a violent psycho). I guess we're lucky Mariana didn't also start dropping bodies (because the logic of his fictional universe says she should definitely be a murderer by now... maybe that'll be his Maidens sequel?). But she especially had NO reason to randomly turn detective - and she kept trying to justify it by saying she needed to re-enter the world or that Sebastian would want her to (??), even though she had no background in criminal psychology... or even a particular fondness for mysteries (really, I would've accepted ANYTHING to explain her dogged obsession with the case. WHY were Sebastian and Zoe so certain she would insert herself into the investigation just because one of Zoe's friends was the first victim? WHY?). As for Zoe and Alicia, their motives are mere suggestions: they were both abused and manipulated, and voila! Slippery slope to murder.

WRITING STYLE

-> Incessant allusions to Greek tragedy and myth, apparently to provide a sophisticated gloss over the bare-bones writing style, which opts more for telling than showing and frequently indulges in hilariously bizarre analogies. Credit where credit is due — the references to Greek myth are less clunky in the SP, and I liked learning about the Alcestis play/myth, which I hadn’t heard of before - but OMG the entire characterization of Fosca, who we are meant to believe is a professor of Greek tragedy at one of the most respected universities on the planet, is just absurd. His "lecture" on the liminal in Greek tragedy is essentially the Wikipedia page on the Eleusinian Mysteries capped off with some Hallmark-card carpe diem crap. The lecture hall responds with raucous applause, clearly never having heard such vague genius bullshit before.

-> Super clunky and amateurish narrative device of interludes written by another character; Sebastian’s letter reads like a mashup of Dexter monologues and Clarice’s memory of the screaming sheep, but by FAR the worse offender is Alicia’s diary, where we’re supposed to believe she painstakingly recorded ENTIRE CONVERSATIONS, BEAT-BY-BEAT DIALOGUE, even when she’s just been DRUGGED TO THE GILLS with morphine and has mere moments of consciousness left… and even before that, she literally takes the time to write “He's trying the windows and doors! ...Someone’s inside! Someone’s inside the house! ETC ETC” when she thinks her stalker has broken in downstairs. WHO DOES THAT?)

-> Speaking of dialogue, the dialogue is so bad. Based on his bio, Michaelides got a degree in screenwriting, which makes his terrible dialogue even more baffling.

-> HILARIOUSLY rendered voyeur scenes where the narrators spy on couples having sex. Such unintentionally awkward descriptions. First we had Kathy’s climax sounds through the trees and then the bowler hat carefully placed on a tombstone before the gatekeeper plows a student. Again, I died.

PLOT/"TWIST"

-> The CONSTANT red herrings make for such an exhausting read. Michaelides drops anvils with almost every character that are so obviously meant to designate them as suspects in our minds. There is absolutely no subtlety in his misdirections.

-> The “crossover” scene between the SP and The Maidens makes no sense - when in the timeline does Mariana’s story overlap with Theo’s? They confer just before Theo starts working at the Grove, obviously (though Mariana appears to be the one who alerts Theo to the job opening there? Whereas in the SP, Theo has been obsessively tracking Alicia since the murder and had already planned to apply to work there?), but then are we supposed to believe that while Theo has been psychotically pursuing his warped quest to “help” Alicia, he’s also been diligently treating Zoe, so invested in her case that he repeatedly reaches out to Mariana to get her to visit Zoe and even writes Mariana a lengthy letter to convince her to do so??? And then a couple days after The Maidens ends, Theo is arrested???

-> But the thing I really did hate the most is how Michaelides treats his female murderers (who are both also victims themselves) as mere means to deploy a “twist”; there’s no moment spared to encourage our sympathy for Zoe, who was groomed and manipulated by the only trusted father figure in her life, and even after spending a decent amount of time getting to know Alicia via her ridiculous diary, where it’s so apparent that she’s been demeaned, objectified, manipulated, gaslit, and/or used by EVERY man in her life, she’s sent packing to spend the rest of her days in a coma… HOW much more satisfying would it have been for her to succeed in exposing Theo and reclaiming her voice? But no, she basically rolls over when he comes to finish her off (SPEAKING OF — ARE WE SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE THERE ARE NO SECURITY CAMERAS IN THIS INSTITUTE FOR THE CRIMINALLY INSANE????), writes one last diary entry, and drifts off forever. And then a couple pages of nothing later, the story is over. GOODNIGHT, ALICIA!

Both books kept me rolling throughout (by which I mean eye-rolling but also rotfl). Maybe I will check out his next effort — I’m morbidly curious what he’ll turn out. It does leave me wondering whether I should give up on thriller novels entirely, though. Are many of the weaknesses of these novels just characteristic of the genre? Maybe I'm just holding these books to unfair standards? I'm mostly only familiar with thriller films — many of which I think are amazing — but maybe you can get away with more in a film than you can in a novel.

...I really only intended to write a handful of bullet points, but more and more kept coming to mind as I wrote, to the point where subheadings became necessary. Whoopsie.

#the maidens #the silent patient #book review #alex michaelides #thrillers #books

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obsessivelycapricious · 3 years

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🧠 What’s an idea you have that you can’t quite call a WIP yet?

Helloo! Thank you for this message, I've sat on it for a few days so I could answer it properly!

I've got this idea for a reader insert/ oc insert DC fic. It's too cliché for me to ever write it tbh. It's kinda a slice of life idea where it's just daily regular life in Gotham really though it'll probably morph into a Jason Todd x yn fic because I'm a simp for him rn. I just really like the idea of a gothamite going about their daily business and having random casual encounters with DC's main characters and being unawares or whatever about it. I feel like there might have been some fanfics that have influenced the idea but honestly I've read that many they all kind of blend into one.

(coffee shop reader insert au anyone? Seriously if there's a fic like that out there hmu, PLEASE.)

So yea anyway, this idea is about an art teacher. This is our (Y/N).

She works part time in Gotham City High School and loves her job. This turns into a bit of a Damian Wayne fic for a while because she's his art teacher and every other teacher in the faculty is having a really hard time dealing with Damian, but she has no idea what they're talking about?? Because sure when it comes to interacting with his peers in class, there's been a few outbursts but he pays attention in class and his work is excellent. She doesn't get the snipping comments and the constant stream of criticism that the other teachers seem to be getting. She just shrugs it off as that she's doing her job and that he's comfortable in class.

So it's like the day before Parents evening and Damian asks if she will speak to his father when he visits his teachers, she was already planning on it, but she agrees anyways.

So when Bruce ends up in her classroom, he's already pretty fed up, he's had some less than stellar reports from his other teachers and he knows Damian is having a hard time adjusting since he came to live with him but he isn't sure what the right thing is to do. He's considering stopping Damian from being Robin but that seems to be one of the only outlets that works for him, so he is hesitant to take it away.

So Y/N meets with him and says - well actually, Mr Wayne, Damian is making excellent progress in my class. He shows a real aptitude and respect for the topics we study and his own projects, both assigned and extra credit show a real dedication to the subject. Honestly, he's a pleasure to have in class.

Bruce goes away thinking hard about it all and being Bruce, he does a background check on her and finds out she is also a qualified art therapist. Long story short, he ends up hiring her to do personal tutoring sessions at Wayne Manor. The ethics of this as a teacher is a liiiil sketchy but lets just suspend our disbelief for the sake of fiction.

Then comes a little montage of her working with Damian in the manor. There's a couple of emotional outbursts at first where Damian doesn't want to think about his feelings and would much rather be given assignments and tasks like in school, so she uses that to formulate her approach. She also sometimes paints along side him so there's less pressure. Damian is adament that no one else is allowed to see his paintings and she actually tells one of his brothers off for prying one time when they are having a break. She also sees and hears things around that manor that dont always add up but she stays professional and so long as damian is safe she minds her own business. Damian reaches some kind of personal breakthrough and Bruce can see him settling down in the house more and things seem good. He still keeps her on for lessons tho cause why ruin a good thing?

So here's where i'm thinking it could be a soulmate au. I'm a sucker for these and there isn't enough imo. I'm thinking that the identifying marks on her are something super generic and boring like "Oh, sorry." So when she overhears Jason referring to Damian as a Brat, she tells him off. He says "Oh, sorry" and walks away but he has what she said word for word on him. And he's a lil emotionally constipated resurrected dude so he does not engage.

Though he does start following her Uber home, just to make sure she gets home okay.

So after this point for me the ending gets a little fuzzy. I'm thinking highlights of it could include:

being invited to a Wayne charity gala (because I really wanna go to one of those just cause)

Bruce investing money into art therapy charities

Damian threatening Jason telling him to leave her alone. Lil jealous nugget.

Jason finally trying to flirt with her only for her to remind him that she has a professional working relationship with the family and it would be amiss of her to entertain him. ouch.

the obligatory red hood saving her from a mugging scene

her finding out that Damian is robin and Bruce is batman and Tim is, and jfc this family.

Finding out Jason's has her words

Some mushy ending where it's all gravy and you skip off into the sunset together.

Told you I hadn't thought it through.

But heh yeah, there you go. A WIP that isn't a WIP that I'll probably never write. If anyone wants to run with it, just be sure to tag me in it!

#Damian wayne #jason todd #y/n #jason todd x y/n #fic ramble #badly written #answered #thank you friend #ask game #anonymous

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valley-of-the-lost · 3 years

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OKAY FINAL CONSENSUS

Pros

- Songs are a bop. I WILL be looping that soundtrack please and thank you.

- Closed the classism plot better with Tori showing she was taking more direct, widespread action like putting systems in place to prevent the root issue (the drought) from happening again and implementing a social services program to further help.

- Tori and Kiera have a lot more interaction and gay chemistry. The plot setup just lends itself better to this, also yes Kiera did announce her engagement to Tori up on that stage and you can’t change my mind.

- Pets weren’t too annoying... mostly.

Cons (this is what y’all were waiting for huh)

- Augh... to be honest I think this movie is a demonstration that the people who made it didn’t understand what appealed to people about the original Princess and the Pauper. Which is obviously fine if it wasn’t trying so hard to ride off of it. Like sure, it’s trying to be the Princess and the Pauper for a new generation but the fact that it’s toting itself as that means its also trying to appeal to some extent to the ones who loved the original and ehhh it kinda fucked up in that regard.

Making the two leads both part of the 1% was the first mistake. First of all, that decision didn’t age well at all. Second of all, it kinda diminishes the point of them switching in the first place in a meta sense?? because it’s so the rich one can realize the class disparity by actually living as one in poverty. Tori literally stumbled across the poverty of her kingdom by accident, and she didn’t really reflect on learning anything by having to maintain an actual job for once as Kiera. Third of all in my opinion it makes them too similar in position. Really the only difference between Tori and Kiera is that one has an actual job.

Second mistake, Tori and Kiera really don’t embody the characteristics Princess and the Pauper fans found admirable in the original movie’s leads. Which, again, is fine if they want to tackle something different, but if they had it would show understanding of the original movie and what appealed to the audience.

Annelise and Erika are both admired for their mature resolve. “Duty means doing the things your heart may well regret”. They understand their responsibilities and what is riding on them and are ready to take appropriate action to see them through at personal cost to themselves.

Tori and Kiera in comparison are like the immature little sisters, Tori at least is approaching from the opposite angle developmentally where she has to go from immaturity to maturity and come to learn her responsibilities, which might’ve caused some whiplash in og Princess and the Pauper fans. Kiera is... well. Let’s just say she got did SUPER dirty in this movie and leave the details for the next bullet point.

- This is kinda a subpoint of Kiera and Tori being in too similar positions of class, but I literally don’t see why Kiera can’t solve her own problem, take all her money and strike out as an independent artist. We aren’t really presented a reason why she feels so chained to her job, like is someone else depending on the money she rakes in or something? Also with the increasing accessibility of tools and platforms for artists to be independent it makes her struggle more... stagnant? is that the right word?

Also I swear to god I thought the ending of the movie was that Kiera was fired from her job and starts playing independently at cafes. Apparently I jedi mind tricked myself or something but in my opinion that would’ve been a better ending for her. It’s at least a change and forces her to take more time for herself, and she’d probably be fine financially since she’s not exactly a pauper as a popstar.

- I thought the problem of the story being unbalanced was going to get resolved later on but no, if anything it kinda gets worse. Tori gets the lion’s share of development. In the beginning it’s established that she has problems taking responsibility/doesn’t see why she has to take responsibility, has a major revelation pertaining to that when she realizes that being so irresponsible played into being ignorant of the plight of her people, and then later addresses that by putting infrastructure in place to prevent a repeat of the drought and programs to address the problems the drought caused.

In comparison, Kiera’s conflict is established as feeling overworked/too busy to the point where she has lost time and pleasure for her own hobbies. It’s kinda implied she’s burnt out but any simple but meaningful exploration of this falls flat as soon as she and Tori switch places. In her parallel scene to Tori’s revelation about Meribella’s plight, she gets inspired to come up with song lyrics again... and this is about as far as her half of the story goes. She doesn’t meaningfully reflect on this in any shape or form so her whole initial conflict literally dies in the water, there’s no major revelation for her to parallel Tori’s. What makes matters worse is that this has no resolution. The movie ends with the dual concert (at least my version does). Kiera presumably goes back to her status quo as an overworked popstar and nothing changes. This is not an arc, this is a flat line.

Which is a real fucking damn shame because in my HUMBLE opinion she’s the most interesting character of the two, esp if you parse apart her section of “To Be a Princess/To Be a Popstar”. Like come on. “No time for friends except for your dog and your guitar”? “Love every fan no matter how bizarre they are”? “To be a popstar is to never act your age”??? Guys she’s one half of the leading main couple you can’t just leave her storyline out to dry like this.

- The villain he... sorry he’s no Preminger. man needs a therapist for his chipmunk PTSD is all I’ll say.

- The prince literally adds nothing, just cut him out of the story already. Also his face looks weird.

- (edit) I forgot this part: It has the same problem as Princess and the Pauper where the royal family is still in charge except kinda worse because in this movie its implied the royal family willfully turned a blind eye to the suffering brought by the drought and pretended it didn’t exist as opposed to addressing it. Victoria may have the interests of the people in mind but there’s no guarantee her descendants will, they’re still under the whims of the royal family.

And... yeah thats it. Almost decent but they literally didn’t follow through with an arc with one half of their leading couple. That kinda impacts the movie a lot, jussayin. Goodnight, next time we might do Mariposa.

#voice of the lost #barbie #barbie as the princess and the popstar #livereact

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naivesilver · 3 years

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@bewilderedmoth FINE. Fine. Since today is a Monday and therefore a day much more suited for a vitriolic commentary on terrible insects, I shall fulfill your request and the anon’s. I’m warning everyone in the premises, though - this is a “no fucks given” list, so it may get ugly at any time. Also, as usual, this is only for things that I’ve already watched, so if you know of some cricket horror and don’t see it mentioned, assume I’ve yet to get to that specific adaptation.

Alright then! To the barricades!

1) Disney’s Pinocchio (1940)

The first of his genre. Look at this asshole - he’s literally the last creature I’d entrust my child to. The fact Pinocchio had to spend his first couple days of life with this guy shadowing his every step is mind-boggling, and it’s made even worse by the fact that the Blue Fairy put him in charge of another man’s kid, as though she had the right to make that choice.

(I won’t fall for the desire of dunking on the Fairy more, as this is a Cricket list, but believe me, the temptation is there. It always is.)

As Disney sidekicks go, he’s one of the worst. He’s not funny, and despite having literally ONE job he manages to fail spectacularly at it. He’s snappish at Pinocchio, he abandons his charge about two hours into the new day, he spends a much longer time flirting with female-presenting inanimate objects/animals/supernatural beings than doing any actual childrearing. He should have been forgotten the instant the movie left the theaters, but instead Disney made him one of his main mascots, giving him the role of storyteller or ghost or whatever the fuck they need him to do at the time. So not only is he single-handedly responsible for every other entry in this list, I keep finding him everywhere I turn my eyes to. A knock-off version of his Ghost of Christmas Past self was in the new Ducktales, too, so my friend freenklin (who already has had to endure many of my complaints) received some VERY disappointed scream-texts as I was liveblogging my watch.

Just...no. Get him out of my sight.

(Also Ewan McGregor is bound to voice him in the live action and like??? Excuse me??? Are we supposed to not make Obi Wan jokes??? Will he abandon his young padawan Pinocchio to the evil Strombolitroopers???)

2) Pinocchio and the Emperor of the Night (1987)

This movie is at the bottom of my Pinocchio adaptation ranking, and boy, does it deserve the dishonor. The story is a weird mixture of adaptation and sequel, approximately a tenth of the characters actually appear in the book, and I can’t forgive them for ruining what could have been the coolest concept ever (Pinocchio as a pawn in a fight of good vs evil) into this disgrace of a cartoon.

As for the Cricket, in this case he’s not even a cricket. He’s a glowworm, and he’s a goddamn puppet too, to whom the Fairy gave life. I wonder, is the entirety of her job just...transforming people’s creations into sentient beings so that they can lead others to a honest life? Tell me, ma’am, do you want to breathe life into my disappointing Powerpoint presentations too, so that they might bully me into graduating?

Anyway, if you’re wondering what purpose Gee Willikers (sigh) serves, the answer is NONE. Pinocchio gets rid of him at least twice (good for him) and as easily as drinking a glass of water, he’s a burden to the (admittedly cooler) additional characters, like the aviator bee, and not only is he ugly as fuck, but also so annoying every time he gets a chance to speak that it’s a miracle he wasn’t cut out in post-production.

In short, disgusting. If he entered my home I’d swat him with a flycatcher until he leaves.

3) Pinocchio (2009)

This is essentially Disney’s Jiminy Cricket, but female, anthropomorphic, and with a passion for books instead of pretty ladies or ladies-adjacent objects. Mind you, a sapphic Cricket would perhaps have saved more than one adaptation, this one included, but I’m glad they skipped that part altogether. This miniseries has enough issues as it is.

I’m sorry, she’s just too annoying. Luciana Littizzetto can be funny, but in small doses, otherwise her jokes start to become repetitive. Two hours straight - and yes, it’s that much, because SOMEONE decided to follow Disney’s footsteps a little too well - are too long even for the strongest of hearts. Plus, none of the characters’ costumes are very flattering, accurate or well-made (except for Lampwick 💖), but hers just might take the cake. It looks like a mixture between a teenager’s first attempt at steampunk fashion and a Mardi Gras costume lifted from the discarded items’ bin at a cheap store. Takes you out of the fantasy more than anything else.

4) Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio (2002)

I’ve talked at length of the weirdness of this movie, but all in all it’s a pretty accurate transposition of the story, from the dialogue to the scenery.

Except for him.

The Cricket in this case does appear in the scenes belonging to him, but ALSO in a long and extremely useless sequence where he tries to find Pinocchio in the Land of Toys and gets kicked around by literally everyone present. Don’t get me wrong, that’s something I would have liked to do as well, but it was totally unnecessary, and it gave nothing to the overall story. This movie still holds the record as the most expensive Italian movie ever made, so wouldn’t it have been better for everybody to skip that part entirely? Not only it would have saved them some money, but also it would have saved me from seeing this guy for an additional fifteen minutes on my screen.

Still, pretty tame compared to some of the others. Could have been worse.

5) Once Upon A Time (2011)

I debated long and hard before making this choice, and I’m not putting him in with a light heart, but before you come at me with pitchforks, please listen.

I like Archie, okay! He’s a fun character, the human side of his backstory was great and gave him a lot of depth and inner turmoil, and the concept of Jiminy Cricket being a therapist is amazing and hilarious. But he’s kind of a shit therapist, whose actions aren’t always what you’d expect from someone who’s supposed to be a conscience and a guide. And despite the show giving us the impression that he and Pinocchio had the same adventures as in the Disney movie (which doesn’t exactly endear him to me - if it wasn’t for his later character development he’d already be Lil Nas X-ing his way down to the bottom of my list), he and August never interacted on screen after the First Curse broke. Not once. And if there’s someone who needs therapy and support, that’s August Wayne Booth.

Yes, I did say at some point that I’d like to fix this in a fic. I’ll write it when I don’t have like eight projects on my table at the same time.

Finally, two scenes settled the matter for me: one, him pontificating at Snow about her trying to do everything on her own, without even pretending to help her set up the stroller she was struggling with at that very moment. I work with kids every day, I know exactly what she’s going through. Shut your mouth and open the damn stroller, Archie.

And two...That one fucking scene where he’s jumping out of Snow White’s cleavage. Honestly, what the fuck??? I wouldn’t even have remembered it if Libby hadn’t reminded me, so I suppose my brain tried to remove the traumatic memory before it caused any further damage, but it exists, and I’m still wondering why. What exactly was the deal with the writers, when they made that choice? I want a glass of what they were having, because by God, does it sound like a trip-inducing cocktail.

Aaaand we’re done! Remember, this is all part of my personal opinion, and I’m not to be taken seriously even on the best of days. Plus, my favorite cricket-esque character, aside from the book-accurate ones, is Gina from Piccolino no Bouken, who is a duck, a sassy little bastard and no closer to Collodi’s canon than any of these fuckers. So yes, when it comes to choices dictated by the heart, I am an hypocrite. Au revoir!

#the amount of time I spent of this is not comparable to the lampwick post #but it's still A LotTM for a cricket rant #meme gif included #pinocchio

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wisherbysharlight · 4 years

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YOOOOOOO MY FREN........ THAT TROPEY BEACH AU IS GIVING ME L I F E RIGHY NOW!!!!! id love to hear some of the other LAMP scenes you mentioned...... as well as any angst you didn't include............ 👀

HELLO NEW FREN HERES 1.5k WORDS OF CREATIVITWINS BEACH AU ANGST WITH BONUS EPILOGUE TO SOFTEN THE BLOW

Tw for not exactly abusive parenting? Just kinda toxic. -Roman has known since he was 3 that his parents expected a lot from him Sit up straight and be polite and be nice to Mommy and Daddy's friends and we'll let you play on the beach later

-Remus always had the same expectations, but to a lesser degree. Roman was already the Golden Child after all, an 'heir and a spare' and all that nonsense But if Roman was good, then they got to go to the beach, and Remus liked the beach too, so he put up with being Slightly Worse so his brother would look even better

-Their roles solidified when Roman woke up to Remus sitting straight up in bed, white as a sheet, and turning to him with haunted eyes. Remus couldn't talk, that night. But his parents did take him to talk to a really nice lady named Ms. Picani((yes i AM making emile a legacy therapist)) who taught him that many people are subjected to nasty thoughts but that doesn't mean they were bad

Their parents called him imaginative. Remus felt like it sounded like a curse next to when they called Roman creative

-So Remus and Roman both wore a mask. Roman pretended to give a shit about meetings and mergers and getting a law degree and taking over for his parents. Remus pretended it didn't hurt when they told him he could be "whatever he wanted" but laughed when he said CEO

Remus didn't think his parents even know the dichotomy they created. Roman was bitterly sure that they did. They clung closer to each other, spending every spare hour out on the water, their surfing prowess unquestionably on the same level and keeping them from turning on each other

-Remus quietly helped Roman stay awake in school when he stayed out all night sitting and waiting for the perfect waves to catch. Roman quietly fed Remus the information he learned when their dad had him sit in on "man to man" chats with other leaders.

-When they turn 14 they both tell their parents in no uncertain terms that they will absolutely be working at uncle Thomas' restaurant like Remy did when he turned 14, thank you very much. Their parents think it's a good lesson in responsibility. The twins think its a great reason to get out of the damn house.

-They drag their friends along with them. Virgil becomes a junior lifeguard with a passion Roman had yet to see in him, watching over everyone like a hawk. Logan gets to read under an umbrella. Patton is charming as hell as a bus boy and he and the twins quickly become waiters despite technically being too young(they just can't carry the alcohol for two years)

-There's still stuffy dinners that alternate with nights alone just the two of them in the house as their parents jet set around the world, but now they have somewhere to be every single day Thomas Actively encourages them to use the private beach for surfing when they have time off, and they love it because they can just grab their boards on their lunch breaks and go

-It is out on these lunch break surf and chats that a plan falls into place, as it normally does, when Remus just says the first thing that comes to his mind Roman knows what he wants now, and so does Remus, and who better to get it than the Creativitwins(coined by Patton, LOVED by the twins)

-By the time the Main Timeline happens(when they're all 18) the brothers have Solidified the plan

They've both enrolled at the same elite school(much to their parent's condescending surprise, seeing as how Remus' grades are actually better than Roman's), both majoring in business, but they swap majors without telling their parents. Remus takes Entrepreneurship and Business Analytics, and minors in pre-law, and Roman takes Management.

-Roman knows, deep down, that once the jig is up he might lose all the money they put away for him. So, when he sees that there's an amateur competition on the island with enough prize money to get them both through at least a few semesters of school he leaps at it

-He trains Non Stop. He hasn't told LAM about the plan and they get super duper concerned about him

-Thomas and Roman end up in a screaming match because Roman is clearly not sleeping and when Remus can't get through to him he sends Thomas and tells Roman he’ll handle their parents

This is when it comes out that Thomas is living Roman's dream that he feels he doesn't deserve, feels like he's failed as the Golden Child and hasn't earned the right to go after what he truly wants

At the Same Time Remus has shown up in Roman's place to a Very Important Dinner because he knows its just time to let the cat out of the bag. His father pulls him aside and tells him that he cannot afford any "outbursts" and that this is a "very serious meeting". Remus gives a sickly sweet grin and goes in anyway, smoothly makes rounds to say hello to all the customers who come to the resort and is joking and laughing with three of them within 15 minutes. His father is so taken aback he actually doesn't hear one of his other colleagues ask if he's alright.

Janus shows up to back him up about 30 minutes in and Remus brings him around to introduce, and the two of them charm the pants off of the few people they hadn't met yet, forcing the Twin's parents to confront their own biases against their son. Roman turns his phone off so he won't see his father calling. Him Remy and Thomas are having a disney marathon, anyway

-Roman doesnt go home til morning. When he gets there, both his parents are sitting at the table with Remus. They all have tears in their eyes and look like theyve been there all night. He'd gotten the text from Janus when he turned his phone on, knew that it had gone well, or he'd be genuinely concerned. The first thing his father says is, "We're sorry"

They have a discussion, and it feels a little bit like the business discussions he always sits in on, slightly stiff and with everyone still not really comfortable with each other, but at the end his mother hugs him for the first time in what feels like years and tells him she's proud that he worked so hard towards what he really wanted, and that he reminds her of herself at his age trying to break into the business world, and he cant truthfully say that isn't the best thing he's ever heard in his life

-Their parents arent perfect. Remus will say something slightly off kilter and they will visibly wince before they can correct themselves. Their mother will still attempt to baby Remus and put Roman on a pedestal. Their father will still turn to Roman for his opinion before Remus. They both pitch a fit when Roman insists on transferring to a local school to save money. But there's progress made.

-And on the day of the competition, Thomas comes up to Roman when he stops by the restaurant to get Luck with a key on a lanyard that says "Thomas Sanders Beach Emporium - Surf and Swim Shop". He'd purchased the small surf shop next to the resort from a local who'd wanted to move inland.

"Ro, I know you still want to go to college and that's fine. But know you are the only one I want running this, even if I have to wait."

Roman bursts into tears IMMEDIATELY and Patton has to hug him for like a full 20 minutes to calm him down

-And then, as we all know, THEY WIN THE COMPETITION. And they don't need the money for college anymore, so they take it and give it all directly to Thomas for the shop, and the twins own it together but Roman runs it while Remus is off being one half of the Ultimate Power Couple on the mainlaind

And Now That You’ve Survived the Angst Train, here’s EPILOGUE

-Roman takes over the surf shop as soon as he graduates, of course.

-Patton becomes a Divemaster/Ocean Archeaologist and gets to spend all his time in the water

-Logan becomes an Oceanographer who creates super detailed and beautiful diagrams

-Virgil becomes a marine biologist specializing in rescue and release and they buy a house across the street from the restaurant

-Remy takes over the restaurant and Emile opens a practice right on the island and Remile live in the apartment above the restaurant

-Dukeceit move inland towards the city so Remus can get his MBA and Janus can have some Night Noise and Janus gets his law degree and they are a Power Couple

But they always take at least a month where they are either off or working remotely and rent a house on the same block as Remile and LAMP and surf and hang out at the restaurant and beach and relive that One Summer Of Pure Happiness and Freedom

#creativitwins #roman sanders #remus sanders #roman angst #remus angst #creativitwins angst #sanders sides fic #romantic LAMP #beach au #this got So Long #AGAIN dont give me access to discord and beach au feels #there wasnt a ton of LAMP in here so lemme know if you wanna know anything with them lol this got way too long to keep going #tag this with romantic r/mr/m and die by my sword

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welcometothebookreport · 3 years

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Weekly Wrap up: 12/20/2020 - 12/27/2020

It’s the end of the first week here at this blog, though technically it’s only the second day that we’ve been live. On Sundays, I’ll be posting weekly wrap-ups with what I’ve been reading all week, my thoughts, and hopefully a graphic that I’ve spent too much time on. At least that’s the idea. School may not allow for blogging much, but I’ll wing it when I get there.

In case the graphic doesn’t load, everything is mentioned down here again so there’s nothing to miss! Keep in mind, there will be spoilers for titles mentioned below the line, and also please do not spoil me if I’ve mentioned that I’ve not finished it yet. :)

This week I read...

In A Holidaze by Christina Lauren

This Time Next Year by Sophie Cousens

Serpent & Dove by Shelby Mahurin

Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard (in progress)

In A Holidaze by Christina Lauren

Rating: 5/5

Warnings: no hard warnings. This is a very light read.

Thoughts about this book

I picked this book as part of my December box for Book of the Month Club and I almost didn’t read it this month at all. After finishing Serpent & Dove though, I decided that I really wanted some holiday cheer since I didn’t have any. It’s a good thing I did because this ended up being my favorite read of the year, and right at the final buzzer too.

Our protagonist, Mae, ends up in a time loop when she makes a stray wish to the universe: Show me what will make me happy. I had my doubts about whether I would like the plot since it seems a little silly, and I wanted something with some substance. Pleased to admit that I was wrong about all of my thoughts at the beginning. Thing is, this book is silly. In fact, it’s downright hilarious and I laughed out loud so many times I lost track. It’s also serious in the right spots, but really it’s a tender story about getting your one true love. However, it’s not only a love story.

It takes a while for Mae to throw caution to the wind. Approximately two return trips to the plane (with a courtesy whack to her brother’s face, actually) in, Maelyn Jones decides that none of this matters because she’s just going to start over anyway. In a fantastic outburst, she barks at her dad not to eat the cookie (he’s going to break his tooth on it), and a slew of other orders because she’s so fed up with it all. Then we see this woman start living when she hasn’t been, and to be completely honest, you don’t even realize it’s happening at first.

She doesn’t realize it either.

Andrew Hollis is the older brother of Theo (and Theo’s been carrying a torch for Mae, it seems) and also the brother Mae has spent years of her life pining after. They’re wicked close, wondrously hilarious together, and by the end of the book - No. By the time I was a quarter of the way through, I was pretty sure I was going to be in love with him too. Half-way in, I knew I was.

I could go on and on about this book, but I’m going to spare you because a) I need to learn to be more concise with reviews and b) I really want you to read it and see if you love it as much as I did.

The Funniest Moment for Me:

I simply cannot pick one moment, but if I have to, I plucked the one out of my head that I thought of first.

When they were kids, Mae painted their initials on the bottom of a mug. The full thing of MJ + AH and it’s adorable. Later, Mae admits it to Andrew, and he holds it up to the light in an equally adorable way and realizes that he can still see it, even though it’s been painted over.

Favorite Scenes

I’d like to say the entire book, just for the record, but I can’t. Or can I? I kind of make the rules for my own posts, don’t I?

Every single moment spent in the boathouse, even the ones that made my eyes water. They’re so perfect together, and I just love this couple, and this story so much I can hardly begin to explain it.

What I learned from this story:

Mae is stuck in a rut. In a job she doesn’t love, living with her parents, and without the love life that she wants. The shift in her is a dramatic one, and you have to root for her. I know I did because I saw too much of my own traits in her. A job I don’t love anymore, a position in life I don’t want anymore, the list goes on.

Mae didn’t need the great love of her life to change everything, but she starts knocking down walls, and starts taking everything she wants. She tells the truth (that she has feelings for this man, that she hates her job,) and she tells Andrew. She quits her job in the twenty seconds of bravery that she’s always had, but has just unlocked.

So, if there is something to take away from this, it’s that you’ve just gotta go for it.

This Time Next Year by Sophie Cousens

Rating: 3/5

Warnings: Therapist Sessions, Mention of Miscarriage, A Garbage Parent, Depression, and Anxiety. Please mind that these warnings are for mentions inside the novel as well, and not necessarily something that happens to either of the leads.

Thoughts:

This one was part of my November box for Book of the Month Club! I decided to read this since NYE is right around the corner, and bam, this one happens to open on NYE.

I enjoyed this book. It was a fun romance, but it was more than that too. Minnie Cooper believes in a New Years jinx that started the night she was born, when her mother helps another woman through labor and delivery, and this woman wins a prize for the first baby born. Not only that, this woman takes what was meant to be Minnie’s name: Quinn.

Listen, the joke Minnie Cooper was funny for about twenty pages before I really began to hate it. The book is over 300 pages. It’s one of those things I could deal with, but never really got past because it annoyed me so much. Moving on!

A chance encounter leads to the meeting of Quinn and Minnie at a birthday party on NYE. As you can guess, it’s a party for Quinn. There are several encounters between these two through the book, and each one of them left me wanting to get to the next one.

The main storyline is told in a linear fashion, but there are flashbacks from both characters too. At first, you may not realize that these two have met before. Or maybe you do realize it and I’m just so oblivious it hurts. Probably that one.

I liked the romance, but what really caught my eye was the issues raised within the book. One character regularly attends therapist sessions in an effort to help themselves, in an effort to get better. The terrible issue of miscarriage is brought up (but this does not happen to either of our leads, but is still important!) and then we are living through a year in the life of these characters as they try to find what makes them happy.

I liked this book, but I didn’t love it. It ranked as a ⅗ for me for a few reasons. I wanted more development. The romance felt a little lacking in some spaces, and I’m not sure if that’s because I had just finished In A Holidaze the day before, but it felt lukewarm to me.

I appreciated the issues raised, and mostly enjoyed the way they were handled, but I wish some of them had been expanded on. I wasn’t a fan of brief time skips (where they could be a few months at a time) because it felt like a hole in the plot.

Minnie Cooper. It’s hard to get into a story where I dislike the name so much.

I just did not enjoy a part of the book that involved Minnie, her best friend Leila, and the proposal for Leila from her boyfriend that Minnie helped plan. It was meant to be funny, but it was more cheesy and it fell flat for me.

Serpent & Dove by Shelby Mahurin

Rating: 5/5

Warnings: Misogyny, violence in parts, religious zealots (in case that’s something that makes you uncomfortable like it did me), derogatory slurs toward women.

This one has been on my TBR for a long time, and I finally dug into it. From the first day of reading, I was not sure I was going to finish it. Religion plays a central focal point to the plot of the first book, and one of my friends told me to press on, because it’s not as prevalent in book two. I don’t know about that yet, because I haven’t read it.

I have so many pages marked in this book for how much I loved it. Truly. Lou is witty, quick to snap, and Reid’s character development is something I’ve marveled at. Going in, I knew there would be a forced marriage, but I wasn’t at all sure how it would come into play. I have to admit, it was a pretty creative way to go about it.

Watching these two characters orbit each other, with each of their harsher exteriors beginning to come down has to be my favorite part, and the main reason I pressed through the parts that creeped me out.

Reading Reid say the word fuck was a highlight for me. I have so much to say about this one, but I’m planning to write a proper review, and to show my annotations, so I’ll save that for another day!

Red Queen (Red Queen #1) by Victoria Aveyard

Warnings: None that I’ve seen yet.

Rating: too soon to tell

This is a book club read for my friends and I. It’s taken a bit for me to get into, but these are some of my notes up to where I was last night at page 93.

It’s quite interesting, and books set in a dystopian world have never held my attention well. So, I’ve been struggling to really sink into it versus how well I fell into Caraval.

The main character is beginning to grow on me more, and I’m curious to learn more about Cal and Maven. I’m certain that Cal is going to break my heart (don’t tell me if he’s going to) and also what will happen with Kilorn now that Mare will no longer be living in Stilts.

I’ll finish it in the next couple of days, so hopefully I’ll have really grown to like it by next week’s post.

What about you? What have you been reading this week? Sorry this is so long too. Eventually I’ll learn how to be more the point because nearly two thousand words is kind of embarrassing.

#kelseyreads #weekly wrap up #red queen #serpent and dove #in a holidaze #young adult reads #adult romance #this time next year #christina lauren #sophie cousens #shelby mahurin #victoria aveyard

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letspurpletogether · 5 years

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Out of the Void || BTS

↳ Summary: The one where the boys stumble upon that one fic and they all end up reading. (This is a crack fic inspired by @btssavedmylifeblr’s Void, because my own words are not enough to describe how an amazing story Void it is, and what a outstanding writer Bee is).

⇢ Warnings: BEWARE OF SPOILERS!! This things should be full of them so I suggest you to read all of Void before reading this just in case. Also, for those entitled rude anons: stop demanding updates from the fan fiction writers like they owe you shit, cause they don’t! And stop coming at them to complain about their publishing schedule. This is done for fun and for free, if you can’t be patient and respect their creative process then fuck off!

A/N: Also, I had so much fun writing this. I wanted to keep adding and adding stuff. However, since english is not my mother language i had some trouble describing the scenes the way I pictured them in my head. Therefore, I decided to leave it like this for now.

(TT-TT) Im sorry, Bee! I did try my best, I know it doesn’t do Void justice. But I still wanted to write it for you because Void is such an amazing story!

That’s it! Please,enjoy!

→ 01

[...]

He shouldn’t be doing this.

Hoseok checked over his shoulder again before turning back to the phone in his hands. It wasn’t like if someone were to come into his studio right now and catch him watching porn.

Hell, this was so much worse.

Especially considering how he was supposed to be working on the rap arrangement for the new song, and not checking out a piece of fan-fiction... If Namjoon were to catch him he was going to give him hell for days.

He had strictly advised the six of them against it several times, but to be honest Hoseok was to eager to find out what happened next to actually acknowledge the suggestion. Besides, he was he eldest of the two and it wasn’t like he had to listen to his band member. Joon was only the leader when the cameras were out. Inside their dorms he couldn’t even remember to wash the dishes when he was supposed to or take the clothes out of the dryer so they wouldn’t end up a crumble mess the next morning.

Also, it was all Jimin’s fault.

His dongsaeng had sent him the link without any explanation last week. It was a silly thing they did to each other trying to make the other cringe with whatever weird-ass story they could find, mostly on Twitter. It was all for the laughs but they had stopped doing it when Hoseok had accidentally send Seokjin a rather explicit piece that involved Jimin and Yoongi in a threesome with some kind of catgirl trying to get her pregnant. It was meant for the young boy, of course and that slip of hand had resulted in a hysteric Seokjin exposing them right in front of the others.

Hoseok has been so embarrassed after that he couldn’t even look at Yoongi in the face for a whole ass week. Even though his hyung had said it was fine. It didn’t help that Taehyung and Jungkook wouldn’t let the topic die either. Those rascals, he made sure to make them wore their asses off in the following dance practices.

But anyways, he and Jimin had agreed to stop.

So it was a surprise to receive a new link from him after a couple months. He’d ignored it at first, being too busy with practice and rehearsals to bother with checking it up. But yesterday while waiting for his appointment with the cupping therapist, he’d absentmindedly opened it and was actually surprised with what he’d found. Written in English, it was a space story... and they were astronauts!

At that moment he been too oblivious to care and read the warnings or summary on top of the post. For a moment of innocent wonder he actually got caught up in the first scene. He was a scientist in space, it couldn’t get any cooler than that! But of course, he had soon realized what type of story it was.

The problem was that it didn’t start right off with the porn part like most stories he’s found while browsing the darkest depths of the ARMY’s fandom. He’d read some weird shit himself, demons, half-animal people, male pregnancyㅡHell! even tentacles once. The kind of things his fans could come up with was exhilarating, and it blew his mind that the weirdest and kinkiest were for some reason the best well-written of allㅡ.

But this story was different.

It had a storyline, an actual estructure, inciting incident, clear stakes, the whole pack. Years listening to his father reviewing novels and short-stories had resulted in him developing an appetite for well-written stories. And even though the main character was that Y/N type their fans where so keen about, she wasn’t plain at all. She struggled, and that was nice to read. Besides, all that astronaut stuff sounded so legit that he almost consider the possibility of the author being an astronaut herself. He’d always been a fan of fantasy and sci-fi since he was child and his father brought him the entire collection of Jules Verne’s novels for his eleventh birthday. Stories about voyages to far and unknown places were his guilty pleasure, so of course he got hooked up with this piece faster than he’d ever with any other he’d read so far.

But he couldn’t finished the chapter that time because the masseur was already calling his name. The scrolling bar told him he wasn’t even half way through it, so he’d copied the link for later and went to the therapist office. So now there he was resuming his reading with renewed eagerness.

The main character had just arrived at a green house inside the ship. And there was Yoongi.

Hoseok huffed and raised an eyebrow when he realized this scene focused all on his elder. Wasn’t he supposed to be the main character here? Not that he complained, though. Yoongi’s fingers where indeed nice after all and wouldn’t blame the girl for obsess over them. But in most stories he’d read there was always a lead, and he assumed by the first scene it was going to be himself. Maybe this was a threesome?

He quickly scrolled back up to the story information, searching for the pairing section where he knew his questions would be answered. /OT7 x reader/

He flinched.

“All of us? What...?”. Did that mean everyone was a love interest? Or that the main character was supposed to screw all of them at once? How was that supposed to work if there was just one woman in the whole crew?

Oh wait...

The realization hit him. Of course, that was the whole plot. Seven guys and one girl, and they had to fight for her love? It was something like that for sure, wasn’t it? She would pick one of them and then they’d have sex. He kept reading—

«Your deepest darkest fantasies- the ones you always turned to on your most stressed and anxious nights - were the ones involving the entire crew. The idea of them finding out what a slut you were for them and passing you between them filled you with an embarrassing level of arousal. You would imagine them taking turns filling you until all your thoughts of loneliness and emptiness had been fucked out of you. And you would sleep like a baby.»

—or not...

He scratched his chin, a little confused now. Was this actually going to be gangbang? Or more importantly, was he actually going to read this till the end? He did like threesomes, not that he’d been in one... Yet. Their schedules hardly ever allowed them to properly date someone, and hooking up with a random stranger was way too risky with the level of fame they’d reached at this point. But the idea of threesomes was very appealing, although he’d never actually consider having a gangbang with all his members. However... he wasn’t going to cross off reading about one just yet.

Just as he was about to resume his reading, the door flew open and Jimin‘s face appeared. “Hyung!”

Hoseok jumped in his seat, his phone fell on his lap.

“Shit...!”, he took a deep breath and glared at his band member. “You almost gave me a heart attack, Jimin!”

A sly grin appeared on the youngest face.

“Why? What were you doing?”

Hoseok cleared his throat. Had he been discovered?

“Nothing”, he lied so poorly he wanted to smack himself on the face.

“You were totally reading it, weren’t you?”, Jimin chuckled. “Did you get to the video part already?”

“No, what video part?”

Jimin raised both palms.

“Sorry, not going to give you any spoilers”

Hoseok rolled his eyes. “Anyway... Why did you send it?” He asked, retrieving his phone and unlocking the screen again. “I thought we agreed on not doing that anymore”

“Yeah, but Taehyung send it to me”

“What?” Hoseok frowned, and turned around in his chair to face the boy. That was a surprise. “Why would he...?” He shook his head, sometimes Taehyung needn’t a reason to do the most random things.

Jimin simply shrugged.

“He also sent it to Jungkook and Namjoon-hyung”, Jimin ran his hand through his hair and giggled. “I think everyone is reading it now”

“Wait- What?!” Hoseok chuckled and raised an eyebrow. “Are you for real?”

“Haven’t you checked the group chat?”

“No, I was...” Hoseok pressed his tongue against his cheek. “-reading”.

“Huh”Jimin wiggled his eyebrows. “Is cool isn’t it?”

“Well, it’s ... interesting”, he conceded. Jimin let himself in and plopped down on the spare chair he kept in his studio in case he needed to work with the senior producers.

“Who do you think she’ll choose?”

“For what?”

“Come on, hyung.” Jimin snickered, “You know what I mean”

“Are you sure she is supposed to choose one of us?”

“What-? Obviously...”, Jimin shifted on the sofa, his face stared confused at Hoseok for a moment. But then he gasped, suddenly realizing what he mean. “Do you mean-? All of us?!”

“Why not?” Hoseok shrugged. “It’s just a story, anyways. You know some of our fans like kinky stuff and there’s nothing wrong with that”

“I mean! I know that! Its not-”. Jimin’s face turned a bright shade of red. “W-we shouldn’t be reading about that. What if they get... ideas!” He brought a hand to his forehead and looked back at him with a worried expression. Hoseok spluttered in a laugh, but it soon dwindled when he realized Jimin was actually serious about his concern.

“Jimin...”

“Goddamnit...!” Hoseok observed as his younger member stood up and facepalmed himself “I’m an idiot! I bet that was Taehyung’s plan all along”

“Taehyung’s plan was to have us... read fan-fiction?”

“About a gangbang!”

Hoseok rolled his eyes.

“It’s just fan fiction, Jimin. Not a proposition”, he said, but Jimin wasn’t paying attention to him anymore.

“The others can’t read that. I have to stop them”, and he was about to storm out the door, but Hoseok had to stop him.

“Hey, hey!”, he grabbed him by the elbow. “Now you’re just exaggerating”

“No, I’m not”, Hoseok couldn’t comprehend why Jimin was so scandalized. “We can’t have a gangbang, hyung!”

“No, no, no!”, he “First of all, no one is having a gangbang. Second of all, why does it bother you so much?”

“It doesn’t!”

“Really?”

“I just don’t want to be... I don’t want to share a partner with the six of you”

“Why, you’re worried she might like it too much and dump you?” Hoseok teased. However, upon seeing Jimin getting all self-conscious, the smile was erased from his face.

“Jimin, come on. You don’t really think that would happen”

“I don’t know, you are all good looking and mature, and more talented that-“

“Stop it. You are not less than us, stop beating yourself so much specially over a fictional situation. Do you forget who has the third largest fan base among us?”

“It because ARMY likes when I act all cute and pretty, and want to baby me like a child. I’m the cutie, the tiny one...”, his voiced turned into an almost whisper at the end. “I’m never the big... manly man...”

“Jimin...”

“What?”

“This isn’t about the story, is it?”

“No... yes- well, not this one...”, he paused, looking at his feet, bashfully. “It’s just the other stories...”

“What other stories?”, Hoseok asked, but Jimin just shrugged. “I don’t get it...”

“Ugh- hyung it’s nothing really”, he was quick to reply, standing up again. “You are right, I’m so over-reacting... it’s just a story”

“Okay...”, Hoseok leaned back in his chair and looked again at Jimin who was standing next to the door. Hands behind his back, like a child waiting to be scolded. “You sure that’s all?”

“Yep”, that extra ‘p’ sound at the end was enough evidence that he was lying. But he was also aware of Jimin’s uneasiness so it was probably better to let him off the hook for now.

“Well, then...”, Hoseok rubbed his neck. “I really should get back to work then”

Jimin gave him a short smile and left without saying another word. Hoseok turned around in his chair to face his computer and actually get some work before the day was over.

But maybe...ㅡHe glanced at his phone next to the mouseㅡ, just maybe... one more chapter wouldn’t hurt either.

[...]

It was past three am when he arrived back at the dorm. He usually wasn’t the one to stay overnight at the studio like Joonie and Yoongi-hyung. But time flew from his grasp like an oiled rope after he finished the first chapter and he had to stay late to finish his assignments. He didn’t want Pdogg-hyung to yell at him in their next briefing. However, the pull of the story was too strong for him to resist.

He had gone to sleep right away, and with the first light the next day he was already reaching for his cellphone and logging into the Tumblr account he had created just for this. He needed to know what happened next, story-Jimin had to be out of his mind to give the main character a video of him masturbating. It was a risky move, he wouldn’t think Jimin was capable of it in real life... Maybe Seokjin-hyung was shameless enough to pull that one out, and Taehyung...

“Yeah, probably Taehyung...”, he mused to himself as he propped himself down on his elbows.

“Probably Taehyung what?”, Jimin’s sleepy voice asked from his side of the room.

“Oh! Jiminie, did I wake you?”, Jimin shook his head and asked again what he meant by ‘probably Taehyung’. Hoseok sat on his bed and stretched his arms. “Nothing, it’s just this story...”

“Why do you keep reading it, hyung?”, Jimin groaned and covered his face with both palms in exhaustion. Hoseok simply chuckled, Jimin’s concerns where silly. Plus, he wasn’t going to deny himself the pleasure of a good story just because his roommate thought his best friend was trying to get them to have an orgy.

“We are not having a gangbang, just relax”

Jimin huffed but didn’t argue further.

A sudden nasal shriek shattered the morning’s quietness and reached their ears through the door. Hoseok almost jumped off his bed to Jimin’s, what on earth was that? It sounded like some kind of hysteric bird .

“First you send me that porn thing and then you wanna talk about gangbangs?! Gangbangs!!”

Okay, that hysteric bird sounded like Seokjin now. And by the volume of it, it was coming from the kitchen.

“It’s not like that, hyung! You don’t even listen!” And that was definitely Joon’s.

Hoseok exchanged confused glances with Jimin that soon turned into curious ones. As if on cue, both of them got up their beds and ran into the kitchen to check on their band members.

Namjoon was leaning on the kitchen counter, a cup of coffee in one hand, the other scratching his forehead. Meanwhile Seokjin was beating some eggs in a plastic bowl, ranting about how much porn was acceptable in a household.

“It’s not porn! It’s basically literature!” Namjoon sounded as much fed up as he looked embarrassed. Seokjin let out a sarcastic chuckle.

“It’s porn! And you are a pervert!”

Namjoon rolled his eyes.

“If you could just read it-!”

“I have enough with the viruses that keep popping on the computer because of you shady search historial!” It was hilarious just listening to them arguing back and forth like and old married couple. But Hoseok was more curious about whether they were talking about what he though they were.

“Is this about the space story?”, he chimed in, resting his elbows on the marble island across Seokjin’s cooking station. Jimin climbed on a stool next to him.

“You too, now?”, Seokjin huffed, giving him and Jimin disgusted look. “Not that I’m surprised, considering your fascination with breeding cats”

“It was a cat-girl! And that was a mistake!” Hoseok’s ears suddenly burned. “But whatever...”

“Wait- So did you read it, or not?”, this time Namjoon was the one to speak.

“I am reading it, I’m on chapter two”, he replied and Jimin nodded along.

“Did you get to the video part right?”, Joon asked and before Hoseok had a chance to speak, Seokjin’s loud huff cut him off.

“Can I cook in peace without having to hear about how much you want a gangbang, pleaaaaase?”

“Com’on, hyung! I never said I wanted a gangbang!” Namjoon shot him a glare before turning back to Hoseok. His hands came to fondle with the fruit bowl in front of him. “What I was trying to explain to this hyung is that I do think it’s an interesting guessing exercise for figuring out the extends of human behaviour in such adverse conditions”

“But you said you wanted to do it!”

“No! I said to explore it as in talk about it! WITH WORDS!”, Namjoon glared at their hyung, as a faint blush covered his cheeks. It was clear that “If you could’ve just listened for a moment instead of acting like a scandalized prude!”

“Yeah, hyung. It’s just a story, you are over reacting”, said Jimin, taking Hoseok by surprise considering all he had to say about it last night.

“Well, forgive me for not wanting a gangbang!”

“No one’s having a gangbang, for God’s sake!”

“I wouldn’t mind”, a fifth voice joined the conversation out of the blue and all the heads turned in the direction of the hallway.

Yoongi-hyung was leaning against the wall, arms crossed and messy bed hair. A slight frown hardening his features. He’d most likely woken up because all of the noise.

Seokjin let out a sarcastic chuckle.

“You too, Yoongi?”

“How long have you been standing there?”, Jimin asked. Yoongi shrugged off a yawn and walked over to grab an apple from the bowl Namjoon was holding.

“It’s hard to keep sleeping with this hyung nagging so loud this early in the morning”, he pointed to his eldest and bit on the fruit.

“You know what?!”, Seokjin scoffed, and put aside all his cooking implements. “Y’all can make your own breakfast! Seriously...”

And walked away.

“So noisy...”, Yoongi mumbled as he munched on his apple.

“You read it too, hyung?”, Namjoon asked. Yoongi turned to him, leaning on his elbows. Hoseok’s eyes betrayed him as they followed Yoongi’s movements and the way he arched his back, lifting his ass in the air so subtly.

“Since Tae shared it in the group chat I figured I should give it a try”, he shrugged seemingly desinterestedm, but Hoseok knew him better than that. Yoongi liked to pretende he didn’t care about stuff other that making music, but it was clear to him by the way he was behaving, that the older rapper had enjoyed the story a little bit too much. “It was good”.

“You’re only saying that because you are not the main character”, said Jimin.

“At least I’m not the character that gave the girl a video of me jerking off”

“First of all, she asked! and second, you messed up big time keeping that memory card, hyung!”

Yoongi sneered at the younger boy.

“I got her off, you didn’t”

“Wait, what are you-?”

Jimin’s face turned a bright red, his nosetrils flared. Namjoon just chocked a laugh, almost knocking off the fruit bowl. For a moment, Hoseok only stared in confussion at them. He couldn’t recall something like that happening in the story yet and he realized they were probably far ahead of him.

“Hey! Don’t give me any spoilers! I haven’t reached that part yet”.

But Yoongi and Jimin just ignored him, continuing their teasing banter.

“I don’t think she’ll forgive you. EVER!”

“She was thinking of me while fucking you”

“At least I got to- to... be with her!”

“You can’t even say fuck without blushing. Space-Jimin is lightyears ahead of you”, a smug grin appeared in Yoongi’s face, clearly pleased with his joke and Jimin’s fuming face.

“That’s a bit rich coming from you, hyung”, Namjoon said with a smirk. “I mean, last time I checked you couldn’t even look at Halsey in her training clothes without turning red as a beetroot”

“That’s-!”, Yoongi coughed, a bite of the apple going the wrong way. Suddenly matching Jimin with his red cheeks. “That’s different!”

“Neither one of you would ever dare to act like the way the author portraits you. Just admit it”, Namjoon snickered. “You don’t have what it takes”.

“Oh, and you do?”

“I’m just saying if the seven of us where trapped in a spaceship and there’s just one woman for miles and miles...”, He crossed his arms, chin raised proudly. “I’m guessing you’d be too shy to get her attention”.

“It’s not a competition, anyway. It’s a story and it has already been written”, argued Yoongi. “And I was her first choice”.

“Technically it was Hobi”, Jimin pointed out. “She was so ready to throw herself over him in that lab scene”.

“Well Hobi doesn’t count here because he did nothing”

“Excuse me?”, Hoseok scoffed. “Clearly I’m the best character, unlike others I’m actually being professional”.

“Yeah, right. Professional until Yoongi-hyung tells you he screwed the main character”, Taehyung popped up from behind him making Hoseok shriek in surprise, followed closely by a sleepy-faced Jungkook.

“You little-! You almost killed me!”, Taehyung only laughed, joining the his chuckling hyungs.

“And he didn’t screw anything- anyone!”, said Jimin.

“Well, his fingers did”.

“Stop talking!”, Hoseok shoved Taehyung aside and shook his head. “You’ve already spoiled the story for me enough as it is! At least let me finish the chapters before we talk about this”.

“Yeah, maybe we shouldn’t talk about it before breakfast”, Namjoon scratched his chin. “Gguk, go tell Jin-hyung he can come back now”.

“Why, was he here?” asked Jungkook.

“He left because he didn’t what to have a gangbang”, Yoongi answered, almost offended, like he was telling Jungkook his hyung had turned down some fishing trip.

Jungkook’s eyes where suddendly wide open.

“What-?!”

“It’s the story, nevermind!”, Jimin waved a hand in the air in dismissal.

“Wait, so we can’t have a gangbang?”

“Are you serious right now, hyung?”, Jimin gave Yoongi the side eye. His hyung response was simply shrugging.

“I like to keep my options open”.

“Yeah, maybe one thing you shouldn’t keep open is your mouth”.

The group erupted in laughter at Jimin’s witty comeback. Yoongi raised the hand that held half an apple and pretended to throw it at Jimin’s head, only to join the laughter when the dancer fell from his chair by his motion.

Hoseok chuckled and shook his head.

What a way to start the day.

. . . .

#void #btssavedmylifeblr #space au #bts reaction #bts scenarios #jung hoseok #pov #bangtan smut #crack fic #bts crack #fic inside fic #fanfiction #bts fanfiction #bts reacts to fanfiction #yoongi #bts smut

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camillemontespan · 5 years

Text

the interview he walked out of [drake walker]

@moonlightgem7 @jovialyouthmusic @sirbeepsalot @fromthedeskofpaisleybleakmore @burnsoslow @pug-bitch @ibldw-main @emichelle @dcbbw @katedrakeohd @mskaneko @gardeningourmet @notoriouscs @pedudley @of-course-i-went-to-hartfeld

***********************************************************************

These are the things I know about Drake Walker. He is half American. He met his wife, Camille Montespan, at court - she was a commoner taking part in the infamous suitor competition to win the King's hand in marriage. Little awkward, I must say. Drake was awarded the title of the Duke of Valtoria. He now shares two children with Camille, his daughters Lily and Luna. In the space of seven years, he has come a long way from the commoner at court.

Having read through my colleague's interviews with him, he seems friendly and has settled into his role as Duke quite well. A surprise considering he is not of noble blood and was known as the King's best friend, riding along on his tailcoats.

Duke Magazine used to be very selective in who they interviewed. I used to meet Dukes who have inherited their title through generations and Dukes who attended prestigious boarding schools. Now, I meet a commoner who can trace half his family back to Texas and who openly admits that he hates dinner table etiquette.

We meet in a hotel suite. He looks, like everyone says, not like a typical Duke. Instead of wearing expensive designer clothes, he is dressed in a dark blue Henley shirt, brown leather jacket and dark jeans with boots. He looks like an urban dad on the school run. 'Suits have never been my scene,' he tells me, almost bashful.

Drake is perfectly nice. He shakes my hand, says its good to meet me and asks if I want a coffee. So far, polite. Good first impression. He's been taught well.

I ask him how he finds being a Duke, having been in the job for seven years now. He now sports a beard, as opposed to his clean shaven face when he first came to public attention, and he has laughter lines around his eyes. He was twenty-eight when he became the Duke of Valtoria and newly married. He smiles and settles back, relaxed.

'I'm actually really enjoying it,' he says. 'I've found my feet, after what seemed like an age. Mind Over Matter is doing well, it's making a difference. I'm making a difference. Everything is great.'

Ha. I repeat that quote back at him jokingly and he turns red. 'Ah, yeah,' he says. 'The famous quote.. Well, it's true though.'

What has he learned in the seven years of being the Duke of Valtoria?

'God, I've learned a lot,' he muses. 'Just to try not to repeat my counterparts mistakes. Be the difference. And also that I am a really overprotective dad - I didn't realise how anal I could be about parenting.'

He doesn't talk like typical nobles. It's.. disconcerting.

I wonder if he has anything else in the pipeline aside from Mind Over Matter. He shakes his head. 'Not yet. Right now, the charity is my baby. I want to focus on it completely, make it the best it can be.'

Mind Over Matter has somehow managed to prove its critics wrong. I'll admit I was one of those naysayers who viewed the campaign as a glorified Boys Weekend, casting doubt over the campaign before it even began. I tell him this and he bristles.

'I don't get how people could be negative about something that is so positive,' he tells me. 'Men get emotional too. If women are feeling under pressure they may go out with friends or to a spa, and people call it self care. So why can't Mind Over Matter be viewed in the same light?'

I have to argue that Cordonia is traditional in the sense that home life is important. Husbands being away from home for days on end so that they can hike up mountains and kayak seems neglectful to their wives. Family values are the most important thing in Cordonian society.

Drake eyes me. 'I can tell you now that my wife does not feel in any way neglected. She encourages it actually. And we raise our family in the best way we can.'

Even with his justification, he is still a Duke with responsibilities who chooses to go away for long weekends to take part in Mind Over Matter. This is completely different compared to previous nobles I've met who attend palace balls and polo matches.

'I want to be a present Duke,' he explains, clearly tired of having to explain himself. 'The campaign gives me a chance to meet all types of men from all over Cordonia. I'm not just meeting Valtorians, I'm meeting everyone, and that, in my opinion, is a big deal. I want to be there for everyone, not just a select few.'

Drake clears his throat. 'Let's move on.'

We do. Does he ever feel like he has won the lottery whenever he thinks about his life?

'Very much so,' he answers. 'I often get imposter syndrome you know? Like I don't deserve any of this. I've got Camille, I've got my daughters.. I thank my lucky stars everyday.'

Drake has had to prove that he is worthy of the title of Duke more than most of his counterparts. He has dealt with a slew of negative press asking if he is up to the job.

'It was a learning curve,' he admits. 'I didn't know what to expect when me and Camille were installed at Valtoria and suddenly were given titles. We both felt like frauds which is why we've worked so hard to make a difference in Cordonia.'

They have certainly shaken things up. They are the first noble couple to pioneer their own campaigns. They talk about mental health. They advocate for women's equality. Their modern outlook is at odds with the traditional nature of Cordonia. Many have criticised them, saying that they should stick to what they're best at, which is supporting their duchy. I will admit I was one of them. It's not like Drake and Camille are qualified doctors or therapists. What can they possibly change that a professional can't?

Drake's eyes widen at this question. 'I think that's so narrow minded,' he says. 'I'm sorry, I don't mean to be disrespectful, but it is. Everyone struggles. Just because I'm not a doctor doesn't mean I can't help or offer support. I use my platform for good. I don't want to show off wealth or my title. When I lived at court, I would see so many nobles who were arrogant and looked down on those who weren't born with the same privileges as they have. I'm different, Camille is different. We want to get to know the public and hear about their issues. Why even have this role if we can't help?'

I am about to speak but he bulldozes through.

'We're changing things from the inside out,' Drake explains. 'We were the first nobles to reintroduce the concept of Open Houses, which is when our duchy can visit our house and talk to us personally about any issues they need help with. We don't shy away from the public, we actively encourage them to speak to us. We work hard to shape Cordonia into a more modern and equal place. I want the future to be different for my little girls. I want them to be happy, to have opportunity and to feel they can do anything they set their mind to. I want them to feel safe.'

Safety. Drake obtained a restraining order against the paparazzi when daily stalking became too much for the family. It means photographers aren't allowed within 12 feet of them and if photos are published of their children, pixels are placed on top of their faces, obscuring the image.

I understand that Drake is the ultimate family man so a restraining order was not a surprise. But what I can't get my head around is why do Drake and Camille, who constantly say their privacy is important, take part in magazine interviews like this one?

'Because we have things we want to promote,' he answers dryly. 'I don't do these interviews because I'm desperate for attention.'

I've hit a nerve. I press on, suggesting that they can't have it both ways. Many journalists were incredulous when Drake and Camille drew red lines around their private and public image.

'Look, we chose to protect our family,' Drake says. 'I think if any man was in my position, he would do the exact same thing. Camille and I may have accepted our roles but we genuinely want our kids to have as normal a childhood as possible. So if that means no paparazzi, perfect.'

Despite the restraining order doing its job now, there are many pictures out there that were released before it came into action. Pictures such as holiday photos of the couple, particularly Camille in a bikini. Everyone knows what she looks like scantily clad and it lead to men's magazines calling her Cordonia's Sexiest Duchess. How does it feel to be married to Cordonia's most admired woman?

Drake's jaw becomes set when I ask this. 'I feel lucky to be married to her because of who she is. She's amazing. But she's not an object or a trophy, that's completely demeaning.'

And yet, column inches are dedicated to how to achieve her bikini body. People can't get enough. How does Camille feel about that, I wonder?

'Can we not talk about my wife's body, please?' he asks. 'Not appropriate.'

The images are out there though. Everyone has an opinion. Drake and Camille are more like celebrities than nobles, which I think is why everyone is so interested in them. When bikini pictures become part of the news cycle, Cordonia goes crazy. Plus he can't deny that she is a stunning woman. She has the whole package.

'Camille is more than just her looks,' Drake says. 'She is fiercely intelligent, kind and the best person for the role of Duchess of Valtoria. If you have to mention her, talk about her work for women's equality in the workplace. Or that she visits children's hospitals at Christmas time with Santa. Talk about those things but don't talk about those magazines that print pictures of her body, just don't. She's worth so much more than that.'

I steer the conversation away and ask about the two of them as parents. Drake has admitted he is over protective. Is Camille the same?

'Yes but less so,' he tells me. 'I think it's just in my nature to always want to protect my family. I protected Camille when she first came to court. Camille tries to calm me down but even she has her moments when she worries if Lily is eating enough vegetables or Luna is sleeping well. But that's normal. Every parent doubts their abilities, you just gotta believe that you're doing a good job and raising them right.'

I wonder if that is due to Drake losing his father as a teenager and Camille losing her parents to drugs. Perhaps they are trying to over compensate for their broken backgrounds. But Drake abruptly stands up, shaking his head.

'No, I'm not continuing this anymore,' he tells me. 'I'm done.'

I apologise and say we won't discuss Camille again but Drake is adamant that he won't sit back down. 'You brought up my wife's parents. By all means, ask about my dead father and my abandonment issues but don't even try to discuss my wife's parents without her present.'

I try to explain. Her background is so vague, her PR team have tried their best to keep the details private but we all know her parents struggled with drug addiction. Camille will politely answer one or two questions and then steer the conversation away, which I always feel is a cop out. Unlike her husband, she does not go into too much detail about her struggles.

Drake bolts up from his seat. I stand up to try to placate him but the Duke of Valtoria won't be calmed. 'This is over,' he tells me firmly. 'I'm fucking done. It is not my place to answer questions about my wife or her parents. That is HER story.'

I try to stop him from leaving but he is quick to pull on his jacket and mutter swear words under his breath.

I ask him to sit down so we can start over but he turns to me, his eyes filled with fury. 'Camille is the strongest woman I know,' he hisses. 'She has been through hell and she's come through the other side brighter and stronger than ever. She makes a difference and she loves Cordonia. She genuinely cares. Make THAT your fucking headline.'

He storms out of the room. He's walked out of this interview, creating a headline that is now out of his control.

**********************************************

Drake slammed the front door and stormed through the hallway. He felt sheer rage.

Camille rushed out of the living room and stopped him from entering. 'Baby, what's happened?' she asked. 'The girls are in the living room, be calm.'

Drake sighed and gestured for her to follow him into his study. He crumpled down onto his chair and placed his head in his hands.

'I lost it,' he muttered. 'I walked out of the interview. I know that's so unprofessional and will look really, really bad but jesus, Camille, the stuff he was asking!'

Camille knelt down in front of him and placed her hands on his knees. 'Drake, look at me,' she murmured.

Drake looked at her reluctantly.

'Whatever he asked, whatever is printed, will not be the end of the world,' Camille told him, her voice steady. 'Negative press just comes with the territory. We can rise above it.'

Drake clenched her hands tightly. 'He mentioned your parents,' he choked. 'He asked about your bikini photos. He spoke about you like you weren't worth anything. I felt so angry on your behalf, Camille. So angry. The thing is, he wasn't doing it to get a rise out of me, he was doing it because he wanted a particular angle for his damn article.'

Camille closed her eyes. 'People are going to ask about my parents, Drake,' she said. 'It's expected.'

'He suggested we over compensate on our parenting because of our backgrounds,' Drake spat. 'Complete dick.'

Camille placed her hand on his cheek, her brown eyes boring into his. 'It's okay,' she whispered.

'I'll order them to pull the article!' Drake burst out. 'I'll make sure they don't print it. All it will do is get other journalists asking you shit about your parents and I don't want you to endure that humiliation. I'll threaten, I'll sue, I'll do anything to keep this article from reaching newsstands -'

Camille pressed her finger on his lips, silencing him. 'Baby, breathe,' she said quietly. 'Breathe.'

Drake looked down at the floor and exhaled. 'I just want to protect you.'

'And you do,' Camille told him. 'You always protect me. But Drake, you can't sue every newspaper that dares to ask difficult questions. It's part of the job.'

'Yeah but you shouldn't have to be subjected to it!' Drake shouted. 'It's not fair!'

'It's what we signed up for,' Camille whispered. 'Media poking their noses into our business and lives. We knew this would happen.'

Drake's hands were tight on hers. 'I don't want them to decide your story,' he whispered, his voice cracking. 'I don't want them to define you.'

Camille kissed him softly. 'They won't. I'm Camille Walker.'

Drake smiled weakly. 'Camille Montespan to the press.'

Camille shook her head. 'Formality. I'm Camille Walker, Drake. I'm your wife and the mother of your children. I'm already defined.'

Drake let out a shakey breath and pulled her into him, wrapping his arms around her. 'I love you,' he murmured.

'I love you too,' she replied. Drawing back, she sat back on her heels and gave him a serious look, her chin raised. 'I'm not upset. Let them print it. They can print all the shit they want but that doesn't make any of it true. You know who I am, I know who you are. That's all that matters.'

**********************************************

A few weeks later, the article was published. It was a short article due to the fact that Drake walked out mid interview. Drake didn't read it, instead choosing to look the other way when he saw the magazine on news stands.

Until he was forced to look at the magazine cover which Camille had framed and put up on a wall of her study.

'Why have you framed this?' he asked, mortified. 'It's embarrassing.'

Camille wrapped her arms around him and looked up at the picture. 'I don't see it as embarrassing,' she explained softly. 'I see it as my husband standing up for his wife and family.'

Drake blushed and squeezed her hand. 'I can't believe you framed it.'

Camille chuckled. 'Well, you do look pretty hot. It's nice seeing your younger self.'

'Do you not like my beard?!' Drake asked, pretending to be offended.

Camille giggled and kissed him gently. 'You age like fine wine, Drake Walker.'

Drake smiled and looked at the magazine cover properly, this time without shame.

#drake walker #drake walker x mc #trr fanfic

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throwing-summers-at-the-walls · 4 years

Note

Hello half valid anon here (i like my nickname 😂). I got through all your fics and they were all great. Right now im just reading a lot of poi fanfics and watch fanvids cause i can't accept that the series is over 😂 --- i know what you mean about fics affecting you negatively. I had this with 13rw (the Show and some fics) everything was so dark and hopeless that i had to stop watching it. I also love to seek out fics where someone is hurt so i can feel my pain through the characters (1)

But i try to read only fics with lots of comfort so it kinda feels like i get comforted as well (dont know if that makes sense). If it makes you uncomfortable or if its unhealthy for you to write about this i completely understand and i dont mean to come of as pushing you to write. I just hope whatever you do will be the right decision for you! As for you feeling suicidal im sorry to hear that. Let me know if there is ever anything i can do to help! I wish i could say sth more comforting but Im not super good with words :( i just hope you have people in your life that support you! 💛

maybe root will grow on you too? Or maybe you can skip her scenes and enjoy John, Harold and most importanly Bear! 😂 Yeah Shaw definately looks really good. She is a bit like Reese minus the caring. At first it seems she doesnt care about anything at all but thats not exactly the Case. There was an episode with Shaw and a little girl (3x5) and i really loved it (have you seen that one?).

I really think Shaw would grow on you (especially since in the beginning she does a lot with John) but then again a lot of her later scenes include Root so im not sure. Yes i love that there were never any romantic undertones with her and John!!

yeah the core four were great. I was so sad when Carter died! :(

i guess everyone sees chemistry different, i think Shoot and Rinch post have great chemistry ☺️

as for John being good with people: YES!! he is always so compassionate and such a great listener as well. I especially like him with children. John and the baby were so cute or John with the boy who offered to pay for him. John + Kids was always a great combination and i wished we would have seen it more often. Also regarding children we did we never got to see a John Taylor scene after Carters death? I needed that!

yes John the badass is also amazing! His character has so many different sides and i love him so much!!

i think Grace Harold was really cute but i dont really see a future for them, i mean he lied to her for so long! but then again they really loved each other so idk maybe they work it out. Im also not into John/Harold/Grace but like you said good for the people who like the ship :)

John and Zoe were great! i wish Zoe would have appeared more often!

I have so many things to say about John and the boring therapist but i think i better not say them :D i wish i could just erase their relationship from my mind!

of course he didnt die! i didnt see a dead body so i refuse to believe he is dead! i also just wanted them to be happy. what kind of an ending is it to let the main character die? i refuse to accept this! -- thank you for the rec i will check it out :) while i do like fluff i mostly read h/c (with the focus on the comfort) cause i just want John to get his much needed comfort :D -- i have no idea where season 1 is supposed to be boring. but idc the people can live with their wrong opinions :D

(today: tumblr user nourann3 discovers the option to indent text after almost 5 years on tumblr...)

Hiii !! It is a very valid nickname 😂 That's nice !! Hmu if you want more recs ! Lol same honestly, I can't believe it's been 4 years since the show ended ! I can give you a link to my poi/Rinch fanvids playlist if you're interested 👀

Oh boi 13rw is so cursed, can't believe I watched all of the 1st season 😬 I remember being afraid of the suicide scene making me uncomfortable but it was so cringe, unrealistic and just bad that I wasn't even that uncomfortable, I cringed when she cut her arms but that's it.

Yeah big mood I project a lot on comfort fics as well. For suicide fics, I think it also depends on how the fics adress the subject. It's something that is complicated to write. If I read a suicide fic with no recovery I'm gonna project but feel like shit. But with recovery, I can project into the recovery as well so it's better ! I read a really good ace attorney fic showing Miles recovering after a suicide attempt, it was thoughtful and didn't fall into the pitfalls of magical super fast recovery/love heals everything, and some lines stuck with me, it was really good and comforting. But yeah if it's just a suicide/suicide attempt then I don't think it's good for me (but sometimes I still read it bc I'm a Dumb Bitch).

Dw you didn't come off as pushing 💜 I'll see how I feel about continuing it or not. I have to figure out if writing about suicide is positive or negative for me 🤔 I mean I'm not portraying John's suicidal crisis as a positive thing, and he reaches out to Harold, and considers he might get better so I don't think it's bad for me ? Another problem is that I have a tendency to drop my wips to write a new shiny idea I get, and then I never finish anything gkgkffjfjf I dropped the suicide fic for the body horror fic which I dropped for the time loop fic, and there's also the hanahaki fic I started last year but I haven't touched in months, plus a bunch of random shit floating around OneDrive lmao someone stop me

What helps the most is venting, just getting that shit out is helping y'know. I appreciate your support ♥️ at least it's not as bad as it used to be

I doubt Root will grow on me, catch me watching her scenes at 1.5 speed lmao, also yes you bet I'll enjoy watching them !!

Yes I remember that ep ! Iirc the little girl tells Shaw she has feelings but the volume is lower than in other people or smth along those lines ?

I hope she'll grow on me bc she seems cool. I remember I was a bit afraid of her just becoming a sort of hollow copy of John, like "look we added another badass to the show". Seems to be more than that though ! Also I'm curious about their mayhem twins dynamic. But yeah if she has a lot of scenes with Root idk how much it'll annoy me

I feel like I wouldn't be able to get the Shoot chemistry bc I'm too biased against Root lol

Ikr the crossing hurt me so much. But thinking about it takes me back to my careese days and my first fics lol. I feel like the death of one of the core four + the abandonment of the library really alienated me from the show (did I already say that before ?). And here I'm gonna shamelessly derail from Carter to the library bc boiii do I have a lot of feelings about the library !! And you're here, talking about poi, so you're the perfect subject to throw these feelings at. This post really says what I feel about it (I'll put the link at the end as well if you wanna read it after you're done with this l o n g reply). It was in a way its own character and its forced abandonment/destruction really hit me (fucked me up when they broke that glass board). It says something that it's one of the few things I remember from S3 along with Carter's death and 4C. I loved it a lot, it was a cornerstone of the show. It was a safe place, a home for Harold and John (and Bear !). I love when they're together in there, I love this cracked glass board, this yellow stained glass in the windows !!! (at least I assume it's stained glass ?), these lights, Bear's cushion, the whole cozy/safe/isolated feelings, just absolutely everything. And yeah later they have the subway, idk when it's introduced I don't remember if it's early enough for me to have watched it. And maybe it's nice, I can't judge rn. But it's like trying to give me a new MC after a MCD, make him as nice as you want I'll be clutching the previous MC until I die. Gkfkfkff I went overboard and off topic but I just love the library ok

Ikr I love how he's badass but also gentle and understanding and nice to people ! I love him !!! Yeah wolf and cub is really good, also I love when John smiles to Darren at the end !! I use this moment as my pfp bc I love it so much. He's just so cute ! I wish he smiled more (did we ever hear him laugh in the entirety of the show ?). Baby blue is so great, Harold and him are such a married couple in this ep ! Yeah same more content with John and children would have been nice.

I never thought about how much we needed a John Taylor scene but yes !! We were robbed :((((

Speaking of John being a cool badass. Here's a badass John vid rec it's super good

youtube

Yeah they were cute in the past. I think it's good he went back to her bc it gives closure to both of them. But I don't see their relationship working again. She grieved, probably started to move on after all these years and knowing he lied all this time probably won't make her want to go back with him. I've never been in love so what do I know lol, but were I her I probably wouldn't want to go back with him and I'd just be happy knowing he's alive after all.

Same I need more Zoe (also she's hot)

Lmao let's just forget about that weird relationship shall we

Aren't we all the same, firmly believing he's alive and happy out there ! It was foreshadowed since the first ep and it made sense but do I care ? No, fuck that shit John is very much alive

You're welcome ! John needs all the comfort and the love !!! I think I have a preference for fluff bc he gets hurt enough in the show lol

Indeed they can, veryyy far away from us

Sry if this is shit I have like half a functioning braincell today

The post abt home bases I mentioned

#half valid anon #look you have your own tag #person of interest #tw suicide #i thought I was done but then i got feelings abt the library

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mamabearcat · 5 years

Text

Into the Woods - Part Five

Hey! I’m having trouble blocking out my big ass fight scene - I want it to be awesome sauce, so I’m spending extra time on it. But, because the first half of the chapter is an entirely different pace, I thought I’d let you have that now. So, short chapter, but sooner! Thankyou so much for all the love this fic is getting - seriously, I’m so flattered and amazed.

Also, a quick explanation - in this AU, I’ve decided youkai age the same as humans until they hit their peak physical strength at around thirty, and then their aging process slows down (makes more sense to me anyway - who would wanna be stuck in their awkward teen years for decades!) Inu’s in his mid twenties, a couple of years older than Kagome.

Tagging my two main cheerleaders for this @clearwillow and @keichanz and also @redflamesofpassion @xxracheyxx @mcornilliac@inuyashasnook @cstorm86 @xfangheartx @wenchster

Song inspiration for this one is The Last of the Real Ones - Fall Out Boy

I was just an only child of the universe And then I found you And then I found you You are the sun and I am just the planets Spinning around you Spinning around you You were too good to be true Gold plated But what's inside you But what's inside you I know this whole damn city thinks it needs you But not as much as I do As much as I do, yeah'

Cause you're the last of a dying breed Write our names in the wet concrete I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me I'm here in search of your glory There's been a million before me That ultra-kind of love You never walk away from You're just the last of the real ones

Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four

Kagome couldn’t stop smiling as they walked away from the dojo and back down the darkened hallway. She was still scared, terrified even, of the confrontation still to come, but suddenly her whole existence made sense.

She’d made sure to never reveal to her family and friends how utterly disconnected she’d felt from her life in Tokyo. No matter how hard she’d worked, how hard she’d studied, how hard she’d laughed to cover the existence of that small soft voice, she’d always felt that she didn’t fit. A weirdly square peg in a teeming city of smooth round holes. The discovery that she made sense here in this place was a little overwhelming, but in a good way.

She tightened her fist around the grip of the bow; it was comforting feeling the roughness against her palm, the weight of the quiver on her shoulders. She had purpose. And discovering it had rather a lot to do with the gruff but good hearted hanyou walking beside her in the darkness. She gave the large calloused hand that was safely leading her through the gloomy hallway a grateful squeeze.

A sudden thought occurred to her. “Hey Inuyasha?”

“Yeah?”

“You said before that you grew up knowing what you were destined for. How did you know exactly?” The gloom was lessening, she could just about see his silvery hair now, and she was relieved. She had always been a little afraid of the dark, and it helped to have something to focus on. She could see his pointed ears swivelling back towards the sound of her voice, and she pushed down a sudden urge to reach up and touch them, find out if they were as soft as she hoped they might be.

“My father was a Guardian, so I grew up here in this house. There was no way of escapin’ it. And then when I was ten, I was chosen by the Tessaiga”, he said, reaching back with his free hand and fondly patting the axe handle near his shoulder. Light from the onsen was filtering down the hallway now, making it easier for her to watch her step, but in the shadows behind his back she saw a pulse of yellow light surrounding the axe, as if in response to his touch. “The Tessaiga originally belonged to the first youkai that battled alongside Midoriko, and it’s passed down to each new Guardian to wield after they’re chosen. Each generation pours more youki into it – it’s sentient to some extent; knows who the best match for it would be. And it chose me.”

“Wow!” breathed Kagome. It was so fascinating to learn that outside her regular boring existence in Tokyo there was a place where something this magical continued. Especially now that she had found out that she had some part in it.

“Was there some sort of ceremony when you found out?” she asked eagerly, moving up to walk beside him now that she could see better. She could just picture it; a crowd of Youkai children all reaching out to touch the axe with no response. Then Inuyasha laying a small clawed finger on the handle and emerging triumphant, holding the axe up over his head with those cute puppy ears standing up straight on his head, a proud beaming smile on his face. It made her happy to just think about it. She was surprised to hear his cheerless sigh.

“Not exactly”, he shrugged, guiding her past the onsen and back into the main room. “About fifteen years ago, Ichiro and my father were asked to help at another shrine – the Guardian’s never usually leave the shrine unprotected, but a dragon youkai clan moved down from Tokyo causing trouble. The bastards thought they could run some sorta yakuza style drug smuggling operation outa the port in Fukuoka, and it would have been bad if it had escalated to include our area. My father and Ichiro didn’t want to take the risk of a physical attack on the shrine, in case it released Naraku. There ended up being a massive battle with several shrines involved. My father never came home.”

“Oh, Inuyasha”, gasped Kagome, squeezing his hand gently, “I’m so sorry!”

“Can’t change what happened. He was a great dad, and I missed him for a long while; still do, but I’ve learned to live with it”, he said, shrugging again. “Anyway, Ichiro made it home relatively unscathed; he’d managed to bring the Tessaiga with him. Said that a choice would have ta be made between me and my brother, seeing we were the only ones left from the original youkai blood line. Everyone was expectin’ Tessaiga to choose Sesshomaru, me included.”

“Why?”

He scratched the back of his head self-consciously. “Well, he’s the eldest – he’s nearly ten years older than me, and he’s full youkai. His mother is an inuyoukai, like my father, and comes from a very influential family in Kyoto with a lot of political clout in youkai society. My mother was human, just a local girl from the village, with no other family of her own. My father fell in love with her and after I was born, they got married. Sesshomaru and his mother had already moved back to Kyoto. They’d been divorced for a while before he met my mother.”

Inuyasha stooped to tip a ladle of water over the fire pit, dousing the embers. The only light in the room came from several covered lanterns which hung from brackets in the wall at regular intervals, and the round full moon rising over the mountain, shining through the large window behind them. Inuyasha’s hair gleamed like polished silver in the moonlight, and Kagome noticed his amber eyes glowed, cat-like in the semi-darkness. She supposed that made sense, seeing he could see well in the dark.

“So Sesshomaru didn’t live here with you?” She put down her bow and quiver and picked up the empty teacups and saucers, placing them back on the black enamel tray with the teapot and tea caddy. She followed Inuyasha as he took the tray from her and carried it and the kettle over to a small sink with a hand pump.

“Nope. Just me and my Dad”, he said, pumping water into the sink and adding the remainder of the hot water from the kettle and a small squirt of detergent. “Mama died when I was eight, from a fever.” He picked up a teacup almost reverently, stroking around the gold rim and over the hand painted image of dainty plum blossoms before he placed it in the hot water along with the other teacup and saucers, washing each carefully.

Kagome swallowed a small noise - she realised with a pang of empathy that the tea set must have belonged to his mother. She had wondered earlier why such an obviously rough and ready outdoorsy type of male should possess such a thing, but now it was perfectly clear. Spying a dish towel on a hook, she took it down and dried each cup carefully after he’d washed them, placing them back on the enamel tray next to the ornate tea caddy. Smiling his thanks, he rinsed the teapot, and passed it to her for drying.

“Sesshomaru only came back from Kyoto because Ichiro called him to let him know about Dad’s death. Both a them thought Tessaiga’s choice would be a formality - they were pretty pissed when it chose me.”

“But why would my Great Uncle be mad if the sword chose you?” she wondered, placing the dry teapot on the tray. “I mean, you were obviously meant to be the Guardian?”

“Uh…” Inuyasha paused, looking sideways at Kagome, who smiled in understanding and patted him on the arm.

“You can say whatever you like about him. I only met him once, when I was much younger, and I didn’t like him, not at all.” Kagome hung the dish towel back on the hook and crossed her arms, glowering at the memory. “He came to my Father’s funeral, tried to get my Grandpa to turn me and my very pregnant mother out of my father’s house so it could be sold, seeing my father had left no will. Grandpa refused, and they yelled at each other. I think it caused some sort of rift between them, because Grandpa stayed in Tokyo to help look after us, even though he didn’t really like living in the city at all. And Mama told me when I was older that Papa had moved away from Takamori village because he didn’t like the way the Higurashi family controlled everything.” She startled at Inuyasha’s rumbling growl.

“That explains a lot actually. He said he wanted to wait until he’d spoken to your grandfather before choosing a successor, but if they weren’t talkin’ to each other at all… keh! It sounds just like somethin’ he’d do. Whenever my Dad wasn’t around, he spoke to my mother like dirt. Misogynistic bastard.” He growled, pulling the plug to empty the sink. “He never liked me either. Didn’t let a day go by without lettin’ me know how Sesshomaru would a been a better choice. He didn’t like youkai much, but he liked half-breeds even less.”

His eyes widened suddenly and he swung around abruptly, turning to face Kagome. “Wait, you said that he came to your father’s funeral?” Kagome nodded. “And you said that the first time Midoriko spoke to you was just before your father died?” Kagome nodded again, and Inuyasha’s sudden roar of anger made her jump.

“Fucking bastard!” he yelled. “He would a known! He would a been able to tell that Midoriko had chosen you, and because he was a narrow-minded bigot, he chose to look the other way! You could have been here Kagome, all those years ago!” He paced the length of the room, snarling, clenching and unclenching his fists spasmodically. His voice deepened, his previous pleasant baritone gravel becoming harsh and rasping. “Always knew there was somethin’ wrong. I couldn’t trust him. We never worked well together; our spiritual energies never blended. And he always said it was cause I was a hanyou, that Tessaiga made a mistake. That I was a mistake.” He roared his anger towards the window where the shrine on the mountain was just visible in the light of the full moon. “YOU’RE LUCKY YOU’RE FUCKING DEAD ALREADY BASTARD, OR I’D TEAR YOU APART!”

“Inuyasha?” said Kagome uncertainly. She felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up in response to the pure rage rolling off him as he paced around the room. She understood why he was so angry. She would be upset too if they didn’t have much bigger problems to handle at the moment. She had to try and help him calm down.

“Inuyasha!” As he strode past her, she reached out her hand, tugging on his sleeve, and squeaked in surprise as he flicked his gaze toward her with a snarl, his teeth shutting with a loud snap. The sclera of his eyes was a deep ruby red, and jagged purple marks snaked across his cheeks. He looked savage and wild in his anger, ready to hurt anyone who opposed him.

But instead of doing the obviously rational thing and running away, Kagome threw herself toward him, wrapping her arms around his waist and burrowing her face into his chest. She could feel the frantic pulse of his heartbeat and the vibration through his chest from his increasingly loud growls of anger. The axe on his back seemed to pulse too, a heavy dominating presence against her own, demanding that she submit and cower. His clawed fingers wrapped around her upper arms with bruising pressure, but she refused to pull away.

“Inuyasha, it’s okay!” she shouted, tilting her face to the side, trying to be heard over his anger. “We found each other, and it’s all going to be okay. Please, I need you to calm down! I don’t know how to do this by myself!” The snarls grew less intense, and the pressure around her arms lessened. She felt Inuyasha’s head drop to hers, his cheek resting on her hair, heard him struggle to calm his breathing. She tried to squeeze her arms around him even tighter, rubbing her face against his chest, the buttons on his shirt hard against her cheek.

“It’s okay”, she repeated softly. We’re together now. It’s okay.” The growling stopped altogether, and his arms wrapped around her shoulders.

“Sorry”, he sighed heavily, still trying to calm his breathing. “Sorry you had to see me fly into a battle rage like that Kagome. That should only happen when we’re in mortal danger. I lost control a myself. ” He rubbed his cheek against her hair, and Kagome made a soothing sound. “Kagome”, he sighed wearily, his voice still a low and rasping. “It’s just, for the last fifteen years I was told that I wasn’t enough. I thought there was something wrong with me. And you said before you had felt the same way. And to find out it was because we were meant to connect and had been deliberately kept apart… I’m sorry Kagome.” His hands moved to rub up and down her upper arms gently. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

Kagome looked up and shook her head, relieved to see the anger fading from his face. “There’s no need to apologise - I’m glad I could help. We’re meant to be a team, remember?”

She reached up hesitantly to stroke feather light touches over the fading purple marks on his face, smiling a little as a blush flooded his cheeks to cover the jagged lines. “Inuyasha? I know we haven’t known each other for very long, but… before, there was this moment where I felt… like a link… a… a…” Her own cheeks flushed, and her expression twisted in frustration, groaning at her inability to put what she felt into words. She pulled her hand from his face to clutch at his shirt, hiding her face in his chest again.

“I felt it too”, he said softly, resting his chin on the top of her head. “It was our souls accepting each other as a guardian pair. A bond formed – you accepted me as your protector, and I accepted you as the heir of Midoriko’s spiritual power. It don’t always happen like that Kagome.” A short rumbling growl vibrated against Kagome’s chest. “You only gotta look at how well me an Ichiro worked together to see that.” He swallowed; Kagome could feel the movement of his Adam’s apple near her forehead. “Part of my training was reading the shrine records. They said sometimes, a pair of guardians is reborn, wanting to find each other again. They said it only happens when it was a very strong pairing, a true friendship.”

“A friendship?” repeated Kagome, unable to hide the slight tone of disappointment in her voice.

“Sometimes friendship, sometimes… more”, breathed Inuyasha, the blush on his face intensifying.

Kagome tipped back her head and beamed at him, her eyes lighting up, a blush still pinking her own cheeks. Then she looked at him seriously, standing up straighter and releasing him from her hug. She placed her hands on his chest and pushed herself away from him a little, creating some space between them. “But first, Naraku”, she said in a very serious voice.

“Of course”, agreed Inuyasha, in the same serious tone. And they both walked over to the genkan, sitting down to put on their boots in a determined way, lacing them tightly, securing weapons, ready for the fight to come. But Kagome couldn’t help the small smiles and glances she continually sent his way. And she couldn’t stop her heart beating faster and the swooping feeling of pure joy she felt when he returned each little gaze with a beaming fanged grin.

❤ Support me on Ko-Fi ❤

Part Six

#Into the Woods #inukag fanfic #inuyasha fanfic #inukag #inuyasha x kagome #Bearpluscat fanfics

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acotarauweek · 5 years

Text

Day 7: Free AU

Publishing Date: 15/12/19

What is a Free AU?

Free AU day means you can write for any au your heart desires.

Below we have included a ridiculous amount of prompts for popular AUs that have not been featured in ACOTAR AU WEEK. You do not have to write for the AUs listed below, they are simply there to help anyone who is stuck and needs inspiration. Also, please feel free to use this list anytime you need! Thank you for being so patient with the reveals, we are so excited and can’t wait to see everyone’s work! Keep an eye on the blog as we will be sharing information about posting and answering any questions that may come our way.

Tags to use: #acotar au week day 7 #day 7 free au #acotar au week

Prompts under cut:

Royal AU:

“Your Queen recently died and shit we STILL can’t get married cause of our statuses damn it.”

bonus: “I’m the one who hired the assassin, well that’s a month’s worth of gold down the drain.”

“I’m not YOUR bodyguard but damn you’re fine.”

bonus: “The person I’m actually guarding is trying to hook us up, shit…”

“Haha, it’s cute that you think I need to be guarded. Or that you can keep track of me.”

bonus: “HOW DID YOU KNOW ABOUT MY SECRET EXITS?!”

“I’ve been recently crowned king and I’m expected to choose a wife or husband soon. Oh what they don’t care about the gender but as soon as I want to marry my bodyguard my mother is threatening to disown me!”

“As a bodyguard, I should really be discouraging your budding feelings for me. Except, you know, I have them too and I was never very good at my job anyway.”

“I DON’T CARE IF IT’S AN ARRANGED MARRIAGE WE NEED TO STOP THIS ‘RELATIONSHIP’ RIGHT NOW.” “Oh, so you want to throw away everything that happened these past few months? Fine.“

“Good news, I think I’m the missing royal child. Bad news, that means we might have to break up.”

“My wife wants a baby even though we just got married last week and met the week before that, and I don’t know how to tell her I’m gay.” “Want me to tell her?” “Please don’t.”

“Sire, please stop flirting with me in front of your potential suitors. It’s making it very hard for you to get married.” “Yeah, that’s the point.”

“… Excuse me, did you just propose to your bodyguard, sire?” “Yes. Is there something wrong?” “Except for the fact that you’re doing it at your wife’s funeral, no.”

More Royal AU prompts!

Teacher AU:

no wonder why you’re the football coach damn you’re fit au

you’re so wrong i’m going to stop my lecture to tell you why au

*aggressively argues for whose team is better even though they’re completely different sports* au

our students think we’re dating au

a student catches us texting to each other in class oh how the tables have turned au

we leave each other notes on the blackboards au

someone’s taking my lunches au

our classrooms are adjacent to each other and we can always see each other through the door windows au

i will yell at you even though both our doors are closed to shut up your class jesus christ au

our students see us leave the same car in the morning and guess what they think au

i’m the drama teacher and you’re the only who can actually act help me demonstrate this love scene to my students au

More Teacher AU prompts!

Fake Dating AU:

I brought you as my friend but my parents read our closeness as dating and only gave us one bed to share.

I had a bad week and I can’t decide what kind of cake I want so I want to do the wedding cake samples at the cake store but I need to do it with someone. Quick- Do you like cake and can you hold my hand?

I may or may not have told everyone we were dating i panicked bc i was the only single one at the time

there’s this creepy person that’s asking me out over text and could you pretend to be my significant other?

shit couples get 40% off??? hold my hand i’m getting that discount

everyone thinks we’re dating why don’t we pretend and then break up so people will finally get off our backs. foolproof plan except i didn’t expect to fall for you

i got stood up on a date and you were just grabbing dinner- shit my ex is here, sit down and pretend to laugh at something i said attractive stranger

More Fake Dating AU prompts!

Celebrity/Famous AU:

I really can’t sing please don’t pull me onstage AU

You’re my favorite singer and I won the chance to meet you this is so cool AU

You’re my favorite singer and I ran into you on the street/at the grocery store/at karaoke night AU

‘you’re a celebrity incognito trying to hide from paparazzi and you’re sitting right next to me and i’m the only one that recognizes you’ au

Some fans are chasing me please let me hide here, i’ll pay you back, promise AU

You’re a famous singer, I’m your personal driver and you’re an absolute pain in the ass.

You’re a famous singer, I’m your personal driver and I always have to save your ass when you get in trouble at some party.

You’re my favorite celebrity, I know everything about you and my apartment is covered in your pictures, I dream about you all the time, but I’m not a stalker, I swear… okay, maybe I do have a little problem.

You’re an actor, you play a villain on this show and everyone hates you, but I’ll defend you to the death.

You’re a rock star and I’m your drug dealer, I shouldn’t care you’re fucking up your life, but I kinda do.

You’re a famous author and I’m your neighbor, I suspect the main character in your books is me, but I was too shy to ask, but now you killed me, I mean - in the books, and I lost my shit and went to yell at you because WHY???

You’re a famous politician and I’m that one journalist who asked that one question that possibly ruined your career, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.

You’re a former famous model with an eating disorder and I’m your therapist.

You’re a rock star and I’m the cop always going to your apartment when people complain about the loud parties you throw.

You’re a celebrity and I’m that one cop who pulled you over and gave you a fine and had no idea who you were, until I googled your name and holy crap, I should have asked for an autograph.

You’re a famous singer who’s almost got killed by a crazy fan, now you suffer from anxiety and don’t want to leave your apartment, I’m the person bringing you food and stuff, and I might be the only one you trust.

You’re a famous politician, I’m the detective with the task of protecting you, you were refusing to leave the building when I got the order to get you out, so I knocked you out and carried you out, now you’re going to sue me, I’m quite sure of that.

You’re a bored former rock star, I’m the escort you called and man, your place is a mess, don’t you want to do something about it before we fuck?

You’re a famous fashion designer, I used to be your favorite model but now you told me I gained too much weight and you don’t want me anymore and I’m crushed, I thought you liked me for more than my body.

You’re a famous YouTuber and I’m just starting my channel, but I sort of ridiculed you in one of my videos and now people laugh at you and you hate me.

You’re a famous person and I’m the actor supposed to play you in a movie.

You’re a famous singer who was jailed because of drunk driving and I’m your cellmate for the night, also I’m your biggest fan.

We are both actors on a well-known TV show and our characters have to kiss AU

“You’re a celebrity and I’m a paparazzo, sorry friend I have to take pictures of you to pay my rent next month” AU

I would include more celebrity AUs but this is a long list and I actually couldn’t find anymore (although I’m sure there are more, I just can’t find them)

Other AUs you could write for:

Single parent AU

Soulmate AU

Magic AU // Modern Magic AU

Criminal AU

1,001 AU Prompts here!

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AU PROMPTS: MASTERLIST OF LISTS

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31 notes · View notes

cryoculus · 5 years

Note

soulmate au wit oikawa where soulmates feel each others pain and oikawa isnt the one who hurt his knee, his soulmate is a soccerplayer and got slide tackled. i really love your work, tysm!!!! 💐

» Word Count: 6,080 wordsCross-posted on AO3

Omg i was looking for references on what to base the scene where the soulmate gets tackled from and this is what i imagined! Just scrub the video to 0:14! I know jack SHIT about soccer though. Everything in this work was purely based off research, so feel free to leave me a message if you spot some errors!

And MAN this was meant to be a short scenario with quick transitions but it turned into a whole drama bomb. You can keep scrolling if you’re not up for a 6000-word oneshot ++ as usual, my shit is terrible on tumblr mobile pls bear with me.

Oikawa loved the thrill of the game.

The incessant beat of his heart against his chest, the adrenaline that surged through his veins, the buzz of confidence that washed over him as he hit powerful serves at the other side of the court – he was enamored with his own capabilities, so to speak.

Today was like any other day. Seijoh was hosting a practice match against Datekou and Oikawa was in top form. They were already down to a match point in the second set. But just before he could land the killing shot that would decide the winner, he halted mid-air as a searing sensation ripped through his knee.

The volleyball bounced aimlessly for having been forgotten. Oikawa fell on his side against the hardwood floor, clutching the afflicted knee to his chest as agony bloomed across his nerves. He bit his lip, not allowing himself to utter a single sound as everyone else on the court crowded around him.

“Coach, Oikawa’s injured!”

The sound of your knee popping from its sockets from where the enemy defender, Yamanaka, kicked you from the side was sickening. Even through the incessant cheer of the audience in the stands, you could hear it loud and clear. The moment the sole of her shoe made brutal contact with your knee, Yamanaka even brushed her torso against yours, roughly toppling you off balance and forcing your kneecap to absorb the impact of your fall.

For a moment, your vision darkened from the agonizing pain that flared up your right knee as you fell onto the grass. A scream ripped its way from your throat, your hands scrambling for purchase to alleviate the mind-numbing sensation that burned through your nerves. You’re sure that your leg was twisted in an unnatural angle, too.

The distant sound of a whistle rang in your ears. Even through your current state, you were hyper aware of everything that’s happening around you. Players from both your team and the opposition flocked around you with concerned stares. Your best friend, Harada immediately crouched beside you, careful not to move your injury.

“Hey, (Name)!” Her eyes were wide with dread. “Can you hear me? Can you stand up?”

You shook your head with minimal effort, groaning as you did your best to remain still to avoid inflaming your knee. A few moments later, a couple of medics arrived in the scene, telling the others to give you some space to breathe. You wanted to tell them that you could breathe fine, but your voice failed you.

As you were being carried onto a stretcher, you could see one of the referees giving Yamanaka a red card. She only shrugged, as if getting penalties was a regular thing for her. But before she could step off the field, she took the liberty to cast you a self-satisfied smirk.

A sob unknowingly made its way from your lips, gaining the attention of one of the medics that was about to bring you to the first aid station. He murmured something about everything being okay in the end and that you’d get to play with your teammates soon enough.

Today really wasn’t your day.

“So,” Doctor Yamano began, “what seems to be the problem here?”

Iwaizumi nudged Oikawa, who was fidgeting nervously under the professional’s gaze. For some reason, he harbored an inexplicable discomfort around doctors. Whenever he visited one, it was either because he was sick or sustained an injury. Frankly, he wasn’t a fan of both.

“While we were playing a practice match against another school earlier today, I…” His voice trailed off. How the hell was he supposed to explain it to him?

Yamano hummed. “Yes?”

He sighed. “…I felt my right knee give out.”

“Did you apply the proper first aid procedures, Oikawa-san?”

Oikawa nodded, recalling the urgency in Coach Irihata’s voice as they lugged him to Seijoh’s infirmary.

“Is it severe? It probably isn’t if you’re not in the emergency room, I presume?”

He scratched the back of his head, laughing nervously. “It felt serious. I really thought my whole career was done for just because of a practice match.”

Yamano nodded in understanding. “Did you have your knee x-rayed already?”

“Uh, no.”

He sighed before lacing his fingers together. “Well, I’ll be needing a clear image of it so I can make a proper diagnosis, Oikawa-san. I’ll write you up a request form to show the radiologists.”

“Ah…” Oikawa wanted to tell him that it really wasn’t necessary. That maybe going here was a mistake because his knee still looked pretty much intact, save for the dull throb that pestered him throughout the day. Iwaizumi even jokingly berated his soulmate for getting such a severe injury. But Oikawa didn’t really know how doctors reacted to that.

So when he was given the green light to get an x-ray, Oikawa told Iwaizumi that he’d be all right on his own and that he should get going. There was obvious apprehension in his best friend’s eyes, but he indulged Oikawa’s request, regardless.

He was glad. If there truly was something wrong with him, he wouldn’t want Iwaizumi to be there to see how bad it was. He already worried about him far too much than Oikawa deserved.

“You go here often?”

You shot the guy that was sitting a few seats away from you in the waiting room a bizarre look. If you could recall perfectly, you were in a radiology center, not a bar.

“I’m not even from here,” you explained gruffly, pressing your legs closer together. They exchanged your uniform with a hospital gown to minimize the pressure on your knee as much as possible. The injury was beyond what the stadium’s first aid medics could manage, thus the impromptu trip to the Sendai Medical Center. But before the doctors could assess the severity of your condition, they needed a visual.

“Hmm, so am I.” The stranger sighed miserably. “I live in another district, but this is the only hospital that covers my insurance. So, where you from?”

Your brows scrunched up at his nonchalance. Did you not look distraught enough for him to just leave you to your own devices? Maybe he was just like that as a person?

You exhaled. “I’m from Hyogo.”

His noticeably brown eyes widened in surprise. “What’re you doing all the way here, then?”

“You ask a lot of questions, don’t you?”

A soft-hearted laugh escaped his lips as he flashes you a cheeky grin. “When I see cute girls looking like their whole world just ended before their eyes, it’s kind of my thing to swoop down and comfort them.”

“Like a knight in shining armor of sorts?” you snorted.

He shrugged. “Take it as you like. All I’m saying is that I’m a pretty good listener. It’s not like we’ll cross paths again for me to hold anything you tell me against you, right?”

You managed to give him a lopsided smile. The gravity of everything that’s transpired today was slowly beginning to weigh down on your shoulders.

When the coach’s assistant arrived in the hospital, the game had already been concluded. Without their main offensive player, Mikage Shihan had to surrender their title to Aomori High for this year’s tournament.

When the news fell upon your ears, the sting of loss almost rivalled the throbbing ache in your knee. But before you could get emotional about your own hastiness, the nurse that attended to you in the emergency room informed that they needed an x-ray so the doctors could treat you accordingly.

Your eyes trailed back to the chatty stranger. He’s gazing at you expectantly and though there’s something about that sympathetic look he’s giving you that’s making warmth dance across your skin, you weren’t really the type to confide in people you just met.

Just as you were about to reject his offer, the door to the room where they conducted the x-rays swung open. The person inside called out your name, saying the machine was up and running. Talk about being saved by the bell.

You gave the stranger a curt nod as you tried to stand up from your seat, almost crumpling to the floor when the sharp pain from your knee shot up in your leg again, but you resisted it. Too many people have seen you in this sorry state already. You didn’t intend to add more to the list.

When the door closed behind you, you completely missed the way Oikawa Tooru clutched his own knee in a deathly grip as the pain, that he’s now realizing really wasn’t his own, came to life once more.

His knee was fine, but he’s pretty sure he accidentally stumbled into his soulmate in the process. At first, Oikawa didn’t know if Iwaizumi would understand, but thankfully he did.

“It happens,” he told Oikawa as they were heading home from practice. “Not everyone experiences it though.”

Iwaizumi told him about how Hanamaki and Matsukawa used their own bond to grate at each other’s nerves. Oikawa did a double-take on that one. He asked Iwaizumi why they didn’t bother telling him, their most trusted friend, about their status as soulmates. Iwauzmi smacked his head, reminding him how much of a chatterbox he was and that Makki and Mattsun wanted to keep it private.

“Ow!”

The woman that’s overseeing your therapy shot you a concerned look. You’re in the middle of doing the exercises that aid in rehabilitating the torn ligament in your knee, and you were on the last of your reps when suddenly, you lurched forward as if a ghostly hand had smacked you upside the head.

“You doing all right there, bud?” your therapist asked, placing a hand on your shoulder.

You rubbed the side of your head, still stinging from the contact (or lack thereof). “I feel like my head was spiked by a volleyball player.”

She laughed. “Really now?”

“Yeah, I’ve been feeling it really often. One time, I was eating and my face nearly pummelled into a bowl of ramen.”

“Your soulmate must piss a lot of people off, then.”

You stared at her, but laughed it off as one of her jokes. Surely, she didn’t mean you actually had a soulmate right? Only a few people were blessed enough to be given one. Besides, whoever got stuck with you as a soulmate would be damned to the achingly slow healing stage of your knee for an indefinite amount of time.

But a hopeful part of you wished that, if you did have a soulmate, they wouldn’t be an athlete like you. Your own tribulation would only weigh them down in ways you can only imagine.

Oikawa could bear with the pain.

On good days, it was just a faint throb in his knee that he could ignore for the most part. His performance wouldn’t be easily affected by a twinge of pain. He had a pretty high tolerance for it, after all.

But there were also times like these when he’d wake up in the middle of the night, clutching his leg as he stifled a scream. What were you doing in such an ungodly hour?

He laid in his bed until the agony subsided back into the usual telltale throb that reminded him that though it’s no longer volatile, the sensation was still there. You were still in pain. He didn’t like the idea; not one bit.

That was the first time he looked you up. He clumsily spelled out your name on the search engine in the way that he remembered the x-ray technician from nearly a month ago pronounced it. He expected to see links to social media accounts you probably owned, but instead he was faced with a bunch of news articles from online high school sports magazines.

Curious, he clicked on the first link.

“Hyogo’s Own (Surname) (Name), Out of Commision for Good?”

Oikawa vaguely recalled you mentioning that you were from Hyogo and nothing else. It was a district far off on the other side of the country. It would take more than twelve hours to drive there, yet he had found you sitting in a hospital in Sendai with a dead look in your eyes. He always wondered how exactly you wound up waiting to get an x-ray of whatever was afflicting you so far away from home, but the pieces slowly came together as his eyes grazed every word in the article.

“The coach of Hyogo’s Mikage Shihan is yet to release a statement with regards to their star player’s condition. But from what we’ve gathered from the team’s captain, Matsumoto Hiyori, she sustained a severe injury in her right leg. Some speculate that it was a dislocation, but others insisted that it was just a torn ligament. Whatever the cause may be, the football scene would be having scarce glimpses of one of Japan’s top three high school strikers, both in the male and female divisions.”

Your back collided with the wall as Harada roughly pressed you against it, holding you by the shoulders as unveiled fury burned in her eyes.

“Do you really want to end your whole career because of your own stubbornness?” she spat.

You have half the mind to tell her that your career would end sooner if you didn’t practice, but Harada would only remind you that you were given a three-month probation from any sporting activities. You hated that your doctor was right, that Harada was right, but could they blame you?

Soccer was all you had – it’s all you’re good at. You wanted to feel the rush of running through the field, the sun glaring at your skin, and the sound of grass crunching under the soles of your shoes. You ached for it.

“Just one month more, (Name),” she whispered, her fingers trembling. “One more and you’ll be free to play again. But right now…your knee still needs to heal.”

You knew that. You knew it far too well more than Harada or anyone else could ever understand. The burden of waking up every morning, feeling like your knee was going to snap off its sockets at any moment was already fair enough of a warning. But you couldn’t help yourself. You needed to move, to constantly be doing something because you’d rather incapacitate yourself entirely than spend another second feeling worthless. Seeing everyone do their drills on the field as you watched them between the barrier of a chain-link fence ate away at your sanity more than you expected it to.

The door to the locker rooms abruptly creaked open as your team’s goalie, Suzuhime, and your captain, Matsumoto, made their entrance, shattering the tension that nearly suffocated you.

Their gazes, oh how sick you were of those pitiful gazes they sent your way. Why did they always look at you like you wouldn’t be playing alongside them anymore? It infuriated you to no end and the frustration that’s been building up in your chest for weeks just…burst.

“Why does everyone have to keep deciding what I can and can’t do for myself?” you snapped. “It’s my body, it’s my career, why do you have to meddle with what I want to fucking do with my life?”

Poison might as well dribbled from your chin at the sharpness of your tone. The two newcomers shot you wide-eyed stares, unused to your seething behavior, but Harada remained unfazed. She’s known you since you were children and even if you were a collected person for the most part, she’s borne witness to your rage a handful of times. And she knew how to handle the situation accordingly.

You were armed with an arsenal of even more hurtful things to say, but before any of them left your lips, the sting of Harada’s palm smacking against your face snapped you out of your haze of indignation.

The frown you didn’t know you’ve been making loosens as your lips parted in surprise when tears fell from Harada’s eyes.

“You’re not the only one who’s hurt by this, you know?” she interjected with a shaky breath. “We hate seeing you in pain. We hate it when you try to push yourself to limits you can’t reach anymore. So please just–” she exhaled, “–try to understand why we’re keeping you from training.”

Matsumoto came forward, pulling the two of you in a tight embrace. Suzuhime muttered something about unwarranted affection, but joined in regardless. You couldn’t react. You never really thought of it that way until Harada slapped you with the truth (no pun intended).

“Can you promise me one thing, as your captain?” Matsumoto pressed her lips in a thin line.

You nodded.

“Focus on getting better. The field won’t disappear, but your career can. Wasn’t that one big shot university in Tokyo eyeing you for a sports scholarship? You can’t lose that.”

And she was right. There was more to your life than this measly little slip-up. In five years give or take you’d be laughing at this whole thing like it was an inside joke. Everything was going to get better.

With that, you wiped the tears that ran across Harada’s cheeks, mumbling an almost inaudible apology.

“Man, you guys are too uptight,” Suzuhime whined. “Let’s all just get some pork buns like we used to!”

The idea never sounded better.

“What’s up with you?” Iwaizumi spared Oikawa a mindful glance. Their captain was rubbing his cheek instead of warming up for practice.

“I think she got slapped,” he muttered.

Hanamaki, having found out about Oikawa’s newly discovered soulmate bond, cackled. “You want to return the favor?”

“Shut the fuck up, Makki.”

“A soulmate?” Harada cocked her head to the side. “Don’t you have one, Suzu?”

Redness crept up Suzuhime’s face for having been singled out. “Um, yeah. It’s my childhood friend. You don’t know him. He goes to another school.”

Matsumoto scoffed. “That’s just high school girl-talk for ‘my soulmate doesn’t exist’.”

“Hey! He does, too!”

Harada waved away their impending banter, her attention solely on you. “So you think you have a soulmate?”

You nodded, eyes drifting towards your half-eaten pork bun. “They get hit a lot. I’m worried they’re in an abusive environment.”

“How sweet,” Suzuhime sighed. “My soulmate doesn’t care about his health at all. He always gets into scuffles and the bruises take ages to heal. When I talked to him about it, he just shrugged it off!”

“If he exists, that is,” taunted your captain.

“Matsu, I am going to tape your damn mouth.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

“Ignore them,” Harada told you. “So, what do you plan on doing about it?”

You’ve been asking yourself the same thing. Soulmate bonds are a surefire way of determining that someone was out there fated to be with you. But the tricky part was finding them. They could be anywhere in the world and the only means you had to contact them were the shared sensations of pain you felt on both ends of the bond.

Your eyes drifted onto the black knee brace you’ve been coerced to wear for the duration of your therapy. It served as a visual reminder of what had happened. But then again, the dull ache that made itself known every now and then still haunted you. Did your soulmate feel that slight ounce of pain, too?

“I think,” you sighed, “I’m just going to wait it out.”

This was bad.

Oikawa Tooru was known for his exceptional talent as a setter and a jump server. He wouldn’t have the audience from the stands hyping him up when it’s his turn to send a merciless blow towards their opponent. But jump serves were the only serves he made, since he refused to settle for anything less. This put an unnecessary strain on his knees that he knew, from the start, he would pay for when the time comes.

That time was now.

He hissed as Iwaizumi soothed the taut muscles in Oikawa’s legs. Matsukawa handed their ace an ice pack, which he placed over their captain’s aching knee.

“Is it yours?” Iwaizumi asked.

“I don’t know,” he admitted.

Matsukawa snickered at the side. “Of all the soulmates you could have ended up with, they just had to be an injury-prone idiot, too.”

Normally, he would’ve told Mattsun off for being mean, but honestly, he couldn’t have been more right.

“Shouyou’s playing volleyball now?” you clarified to your mother, who was giving you your afternoon massage.

She hummed. “Your aunt told me their school’s fighting to qualify as Miyagi’s representative for nationals. They got us tickets to watch their semifinals game.”

You couldn’t ever picture your little cousin, Shouyou, being able to touch the top of a volleyball net. He never even showed the vaguest interest in any kind of sport! Whenever his family visited yours in Hyogo a few years back, you always tried to get him into soccer one way or another. But he was as stubborn as an ox. Now, you’re hearing he’s playing to qualify for a national-level tournament for their prefecture?

“Miyagi, huh? That’s where I…” You frowned. No, you weren’t going to dwell on it any longer. “When’s the game?”

“This Friday, but we’re leaving on Thursday night. Your father’s driving.”

School wasn’t particularly hectic this time around, so you shrugged, agreeing with your mother to go all the way back to the place where some of your dreams were crushed. It wouldn’t do anyone harm, right?

Things were looking pretty dire for Seijoh. The little chibi – no, his entire team wasn’t letting up at all. It annoyed Oikawa more than it should. How did they still have that much determination left?

Oikawa’s breath came out a little shaky as Mr. Refreshing and the little shrimp attempted to send the ball back to Seijoh. But Oikawa saw through the feint. Sugawara set it into the ace’s direction instead, who promptly slammed it down with unparalleled precision. Hanamaki was quick to react, diving for it without a second’s hesitation. The receive was off and it was flying away from the court, but Oikawa’s feet moved before he could even set a plan in stone.

He forced his legs into sprints as he snapped his arm and pointed an index finger in the direction of the person he trusted most. His eyes flashed with fiery determination and the flames spread to Iwaizumi’s as well. It seemed impossible. It would be one of the riskiest sets he would have to make in his whole career thus far, but if he didn’t take it, he would just be admitting defeat.

Oikawa launched himself into the air, twisting his torso in the direction of Seijoh’s ace and put the ball back in play all the way from where he set it from outside the court. Iwaizumi nodded in understanding, bending his knees for the sole purpose of connecting it. Naturally, the rules of physics still applied in a volleyball game and gravity eventually brought Oikawa back on the ground, at the cost of his back colliding with some of the metal chairs set aside.

But Iwaizumi didn’t disappoint. He was already flying, arm pulled back in a spiking stance before the ball could even come to him. He trusted Oikawa’s accuracy enough to make this shot possible. There was no one else that could pull this off.

The captain grit his teeth, struggling to get back on his feet, but a sheet of black cloth was on the floor, making him lose traction in his shoes. The urgency in his action made him slip, his bad knee – your bad knee – colliding with the floor. The familiar sting in his bones flared back into life, but he couldn’t afford to pay it any mind.

He was running. Running even if his knee screamed for him to stop. Running even if his lungs burned for a breather. Running because even if Iwaizumi connected his set with a beautiful spike, that blasted Karasuno delinquent was definitely going to receive it–

A pained scream momentarily distracted him from everything happening on the court. It was strange. He never let what was going on in the stands distract him from a game, whether it be Seijoh’s supporters egging them on or some other matter than didn’t require his attention.

But he could see it. The way you crumpled on the stairs a few levels above in the stands, clutching your knee to chest as you howled in agony. His heart stopped at the sight.

What were you doing here?

“It hurts! It hurts!” you sobbed into your father’s shirt, fingers clamped around your aching leg. The all-too familiar pain erupted in your knee at the very same time that familiar face slipped on the court. You knew it wasn’t just a coincidence that the chatty stranger from a few months back was in the very same match as Shouyou.

“Shh, we’re going to get your meds, baby,” your father cooed as he carefully hooked his arm under your knees and supported your back with the other. “Just hold out for a while.”

You could vaguely hear your mother apologizing to your aunt, but all your mind could focus on was how beautiful his eyes were. They were looking straight at you with crackling intensity. But before you could spend any longer drowning in those hazel eyes, your father carried you out of the stands, whispering words of consolation in your ear.

“Oikawa-san!”

Yahaba’s shout pulled Oikawa back into focus and he could clearly see Tobio running about on the court, going into position for their freak quick. A menacing smile graced Oikawa’s lips. That’s what he wanted – for his junior to use their ultimate weapon and fail.

But something was wrong.

Iwaizumi, Kindaichi, and Kyoutani – the three of them, at the same time, lunged in an attempt to sully the ball’s trajectory. But they shouldn’t. The chibi’s arms were angled too obtuse. The shot was definitely going outside. He was about to bark at them to stop being a couple of idiots, but there was no reversing it.

Even if you can’t stop it, touch it, that’s what Oikawa always told them. He shouldn’t go back on his own teachings now.

The chibi’s spike grazed Iwaizumi’s fingers. Out of instinct, Oikawa pulled his arms to the side in a pathetic attempt to receive, but he knew it was in vain. If only he stood a few feet at the back, maybe he could have had better odds.

But fate has always been cruel to the ordinary.

As all eyes were on the outplayed volleyball, none of the players dared to draw a breath. But seeing that Oikawa was already their last line of defense, it collided with the floor, the echoing sound imprinted in his mind for the rest of his days.

Seijoh had fallen.

“When I find that boy, I’m going to beat him to a pulp,” your father flatly proclaimed when you finished your story. The three of you were back in the Hinatas’ living room, your mother having soothed your knee with her otherworldly massage.

“Dad, no,” you pleaded, but knew he didn’t mean the threat. At least, not entirely.

“I’m going to have to agree with your father, sweetie,” your mother caressed your hair. “He must know what’s going on with you by now. He should be more careful.”

You rolled your eyes. “Mom, I should have been careful. Who knows what he went through when I got slide tackled in the Aomori game.”

She hesitated before sighing in defeat. Your parents then shared a look, presumably having a telepathic conversation as to what your next course of action should be.

But before they could make that decision for you, Shouyou emerged from the hallway.

“You’re…soulmates with the Grand King?”

You didn’t know who this ‘grand king’ was, but he probably meant the chatty stranger turned volleyball player you met eyes with earlier today. You shot Shouyou a pained smile.

“Yeah.”

“Iwa-chan, I don’t get why we’re in rival territory. Why won’t you just tell me?” Oikawa simpered as Iwaizumi dragged him along further inside Karasuno’s campus. A few girls they passed by shot him knowing glances, which was odd. Most females would swoon at the sight of Oikawa Tooru.

“Shut up, Shittykawa,” Iwaizumi dismissed before letting go of his best friend’s collar when they arrive at the school’s gym. “Someone wants to see you.”

Oikawa narrowed his eyes. “If it’s Tobio-chan, tell him to forget it! As if I’ll let him gloat about their victory in my face.”

“Dumbass, it’s not him! None of the players are looking for you!”

“Then why are we even here in the first place?”

“Uhm, hello?”

It’s been months since Oikawa’s heard that voice, but even now, he could still associate your face with it. You peeked your head from inside Karasuno’s gym. The sound of volleyball shoes scraping against the polished floor spilling from inside almost made Oikawa nostalgic, but he was preoccupied with something else entirely.

You grinned at him, but your eyes held a hint of shyness in them. Oikawa didn’t know whose breath hitches, but he’s definitely having a hard time taking in oxygen at the sight of your face, more vibrant than the first time he saw you in Sendai. His eyes glazed over the knee brace slapped on your right knee – it looked painfully similar to the one he needed to wear in games.

“I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time,” came your sheepish apology. “If I’d been more careful back then, you could’ve beat these guys… But I was rooting for Shouyou from the start, so…”

Oikawa didn’t know anyone named Shouyou, but he must have been someone close enough to you that you’d go all the way from Hyogo to watch their game against Karasuno. He made sure to shower whoever Shouyou was with infinite affection for finally, finally bringing you back to him.

Shit, he’s hot.

You didn’t remember mister chatterbox from the hospital being this attractive. Maybe you just had such a terribly pessimistic view of the world at the time that you missed how unfairly good-looking he was.

You could feel the warmth spreading all over your face at apologizing profusely for your past mishandling of your current predicament. But he dismissed all of your concerns with a lighthearted laugh that sounded like a symphony in your ears.

“(Surname) (Name), Japan’s number three striker, is apologizing for an injury she didn’t even mean to get? You’re quite the saint, are you?” The way your name rolled off his tongue tugged at your heartstrings more than it should. Stupid soulmate bonds, making you lose composure all the damn time.

“You know who I am?” you queried, rather amused with this revelation.

He offered a nonchalant shrug. “I do my research.”

The two of you stood there, carefully taking in each other as much as you could. You almost felt bad for the friend he brought with him, who stepped aside as to not interrupt your first meeting with your soulmate. But knowing that he’s the boy who’s always getting smacked in the head, the one that made you feel the sting of a service ace on the tips of your fingers, and the very same guy that powered through the burden you unknowingly shoved into his plate all with an award-winning grin on his face, it was all worth it.

This was Oikawa Tooru, one of the most amazing setters in the high school volleyball scene.

But why did he look like he was about to cry?

Oikawa couldn’t help it. He threw his arms around you and took a long whiff of your scent. Ever since he ensured your identity, he couldn’t help but think of all the times your pain was transmitted to him. Those days were difficult for him, alone, already, what more for the person actually suffering the affliction?

Gentle fingers tangled themselves in your hair as he pulled you as tight as he could into his own body. His arms shook with the sheer emotions coursing through his veins and–

“Why are you crying?”

He sighed, placing his hands on your shoulders. You eyed him bizarrely, but concern was lining your features, nonetheless.

“I hurt you.”

You snorted.

“I’m pretty sure I’ve hurt you more times than the other way around,” you retorted, smiling up at him. “What kind of athlete would I be if I had a shitty pain tolerance?”

His eyes widened, taken aback with your reply. Admittedly, he already planned his first meeting with you in his imagination dozens of times. Only he didn’t expect for it to be in Karasuno, a day after his last volleyball game in high school. But he imagined himself letting his emotions lose, apologizing for hurting you, and you clasping his hands in forgiveness. He didn’t exactly write it in the script for you to take the blame, yourself, too.

You were simply full of surprises.

You spent the rest of the afternoon talking and talking until the sun was beginning to bleed into the horizon.

Oikawa Tooru was an interesting person. He loved volleyball, had a penchant for milk bread, and admitted that he may be quite the narcissist at times. He told you that Tobio-chan, one of Shouyou’s teammates, was a junior that finally surpassed him. (There was a bitter undercurrent to his voice as he told that part.) He was going to Tokyo for college and–

“For real? I’m headed for Tokyo, too,” you chuckled, lacing your fingers together on your lap.

Oikawa quirked an eyebrow. “Do you happen to be on a sports scholarship as well?”

You hummed, smiling playfully. “I dunno. Could the number three high school striker of Japan be able to land a scholarship even after this shitty injury?”

“Hmm…probably not.” Oikawa shook his head.

That reply garnered a pout. “Why not?”

He shrugged. “I haven’t seen her play yet. She’s seen me play, and we both know that my skill is already university-tier.”

“Yet, you still lost,” you sighed dramatically.

The offended look on his face was priceless. “You didn’t have to go that far!”

You bellowed a hearty laugh, clutching your stomach at the puppy eyes he’s sending your way. Never could you have imagined that same boy from the radiology center being gifted with a whimsical persona so in tune with your own. Weirdly, you’re thankful for the injury that linked you to him.

But as your laughter died down, the sun had already set. Your mother told you to be back with Shouyou and from the looks of it, the boys were already cleaning up inside the gym.

You glanced at Oikawa, who was contently gazing at you with a small smile.

“I’m going back to Hyogo tonight,” you imparted.

He gave you a curt nod. “Have a safe trip.”

“What, you’re not going to proclaim your love for me and force me to never leave your side again?”

Oikawa wrinkled his nose at such a bold statement. “You’re pretty, but not that pretty.”

“Hey!”

“I jest. I jest,” he chuckled, tucking in a lone tuft of your hair behind your ear. The graze of his fingers against the skin of your cheek made your lips part in a mute sigh.

“All I’m saying is what’s there to fret about when we have–” he gestured towards your knee, “–this bonding us?”

“You saying you want me to get injured again, Tooru?”

“Oh, say my name again.”

“Pervert!”

“No! It really sounded nice in your voice!”

“(Name)-neesan!”

Your heart almost sank at the sound of Shouyou’s voice. He emerged from the entrance with his gym bag slung across his shoulder. With a polite smile, he asked if you were ready to go.

You almost told him that, yes, you were, but that’s until Oikawa hissed at him like a cat.

“You’re the Shouyou that brought us together?” he accused with thinly veiled apprehension, to which Shouyou laughed.

“That’s right, Grand King! You owe me now!”

“I owe nothing to any of you Karasuno folk!”

You rolled your eyes to pull Oikawa into an abrupt embrace, which effectively snapped him out of his hostility towards your younger cousin. He stammered with his words, but they remained forgotten when you whispered in his ear:

“See you in Tokyo.”

#haikyuu!!#haikyuu!! headcanons #haikyuu x reader #oikawa tooru #oikawa tooru hc #oikawa tooru x reader #im crying #soulmate au #this was so much fun to wrITE #I LOVE HIM #the grand king of mY LIFE #hqscenario

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voidpants · 5 years

Note

Convin with "Sorry, were you sleeping?"

Gavin isn’t a heavy sleeper.

Hasn’t been for the last twenty years.

It’s left him chronically sleep-deprived, but he’d rather wake up every half hour from the cats moving around the apartment, or his neighbor’s squeaky door, than to sleep through something he shouldn’t. Again.

(His therapist, when he had one, called it “hypervigilance” and “unhealthy,” but personally he just calls it a reasonable response to past experience.)

So, he’s awake and alert before the second knock even lands on his door.

A quick glance at the alarm clock says that it’s 4:27 in the morning, and God, he’s going to punch whoever thought waking him on fifty minutes of sleep after an eighteen hour shift was a good idea.

He rolls Dumbass gently off his back and onto the bed, and she lets out an angry mrrp in response before falling immediately back asleep. Gavin tries very hard not to be jealous of what amounts to nine pounds of fur and outrageous stupidity.

The apartment is bright outside his bedroom, and he squints, tired eyes irritated by the light as he staggers sluggishly towards the front door, the early morning silence interrupted only by another two knocks, halfhearted and hesitant.

He pulls open the door just as Connor raises his hand to knock again, and no, no, it’s way too early, and he’s way too tired for… much of anything, to be entirely fucking honest, but especially interacting with a coworker that he only vaguely tolerates.

“Tin can, it’s four fucking thirty in the morning,” he says, trying to rub the blur from his eyes. “…Why?”

“Oh,” Connor says, hand still hanging confused in the air, bland smile on his face. “Sorry, were you sleeping?”

It’s very tempting to just slam the door in his face and go back to bed and stay there for the next twelve hours.

Unspeakably tempting.

But the thing is, even fucked up from sleep deprivation, Gavin is an observant son of a bitch. It’s why he’s a good cop.

And Connor isn’t looking right.

He’s standing too straight, too still. His eyes are too wide and blank. His face too perfectly pleasant, plasticy. The way he’s moving his hands to rest behind his back is too deliberate.

He reminds Gavin of the first time they met, back when he hadn’t deviated yet. Or was pretending he hadn’t. Whatever.

He looks like a machine.

He looks like he’s trying to keep it together and isn’t doing the best job.

Fuck my life, Gavin thinks, sighing as he turns to walk towards the kitchen. He’s going to need the fucking coffee.

Connor closes the front door with a soft click before following him quietly into the apartment, hovering in the doorway to the kitchen as Gavin fucks around with the coffeemaker.

“I’m sorry for waking you up,” Connor says after a couple of minutes, voice carefully even.

“Sure, whatever,” Gavin says, closing his eyes and resting his forehead against a cupboard as he waits for his coffee. “You didn’t tell me why, though.”

Connor goes silent again, and Gavin can feel his eyes boring into the back of his neck. The sensation has the dread crawling up his spine, old and familiar, but it can’t carve through the bone deep exhaustion enough to become real panic, and he can reason against it. Connor won’t hurt him, or at least not in a way that matters.

He doesn’t push, just prepares his coffee, and lets Connor work out whatever he wants to say.

“You…” Connor starts, hesitant, the slightest static cutting into the word. “I am equipped with very advanced psychological assessment software,” he settles on. “The main focus of the programs are of course to estimate a suspect’s likelihood of guilt, and to determine an optimal strategy for interrogation in order to secure a confession, but there are broader applications; my first mission was as a hostage negotiator.”

A pause.

“I’m very good at… seeing trauma, in victims.”

And Gavin’s going to have to stop him right fucking there, because this isn’t going to happen. They’re not friends, and it wouldn’t even matter if they were, because Gavin doesn’t talk about this to anyone.

“Well, thanks for the Android Zone marketing bit, it was very interesting,” he says, turning around to face him, watching Connor over the rim of his mug as he takes a sip of coffee. “Do you have a point to this that doesn’t end in me kicking your plastic ass out of my apartment?”

And fuck, Connor’s face crumples, and he looks so goddamn frail and human, wringing his shaking hands, standing in Gavin’s kitchen with tears rolling down his cheeks. “How do you bear it?” he asks, voice anguished in a way he’s never heard it before. “I don’t know- I don’t know what happened to you, but something did. And you- You go to work every day, and you keep it together, and I just- I need to know how? Because I can’t- I can’t seem to find a way for myself?”Gavin moves without thinking, the same way he does at a crime scene, faced with a terrified victim or witness; close but not too close, hand careful and light against Connor’s elbow, leading without forcing as he sits him down in one of the kitchen chairs, drags another up for himself with his free hand, maintaining that one simple point of contact.

“I’m supposed to live and be a symbol to my people, but I hear her voice all the time,” Connor sobs, hiding his eyes in his sleeve. “When I do well at work, it’s her praising me. When I fail, it’s like I’m trapped again, her disapproval weighing me down and freezing my processes. I feel guilty when I act like a machine because I should be alive, and I feel guilty when I don’t because she would be so angry with me.”

“Sounds like a real bitch of a situation,” Gavin says, eventually, once Connor’s sobs have died out, because what else fucking is there?

And it makes Connor laugh through his tears, so at least that’s something.

“I’m just so tired, I just want to know how to keep it under control,” he whispers, voice wobbly and weak.

“Yeah, I know,” Gavin sighs. “Look, I don’t think you should look to me as some sort of… fucking authority on how to deal with your fucked past, alright? I’m a dysfunctional bastard. No advice I can give you will be good for you. And your whole coming here and pulling this shit on me, just dragging my past out like you have that right is… pretty fucked, too.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, small and ashamed, and Gavin is just so fucking tired.

“Yeah well.” Gavin shrugs, getting up from his chair, hand carefully making it to Connor’s shoulder instead. “You’re lucky I’m running on no fucking sleep because if I was awake enough to get angry I’d probably shoot you.”

“Lucky me,” Connor says, smiling wanly at some point vaguely to the left of Gavin’s head.

“You can sleep here tonight,” Gavin offers, because he’s a fucking weak bitch and pathologically unable to make good life decisions for himself. “Or go into standby or whatever it is you tin cans do. And tomorrow you can get a fucking shrink, and learn about boundaries or some shit. Okay?”

Connor nods. “Okay.”

“Cool. I’m gonna go fucking sleep.”

#tearstainedashes #meme response #my fic #convin #reed800 #not very shippy sorry they got real messy #cw for unspecified past abuse

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laurasinele · 5 years

Text

Magpies

Prompt 4: “I know you didn’t ask for this”

Fanfic from: the Harry Potter series

Tags: preslash Drarry, epilogue what epilogue, heavy dialog, seven years post Battle of Hogwarts, ofc, Harry & Draco’s friendship, mental health, guilt

Warnings: mild swearing, mentions of abuse, mentions of war, mentions of death

Ao3

Outside the window a couple of magpies were fighting over an apple, effectively distracting him from his reading. Not that he was very focused to begin with. One of the birds had picked a rotten apple from the orchard ground and the other was trying to steal it. They cawed angrily and flopped their wings in ampulous, threatening motions while clashing talons. Draco was engrossed by their belligerent dance, open book forgotten on his lap.

The hinges of the reading room door screeched as it opened. All the elfs in the Manor had left to work at Hogwarts or the Ministry immediately after Draco informed them of that possibility, so there was no one left to oil the joints nor announce visitors. Not that there was any need. The only visits he got regularly were Ministry’s agents on Ministry’s business or his designated/volunteered auror, checking weekly on the conditions to his house arrest. Mother wasn’t allowed to leave St. Mungo’s and his aunt Andromeda, who was trying to forge a family bond with him, was always sensible enough to owl before coming. By the works of the DMLE, the doors and floo system would not open for anybody else.

Aware of this at all times, Draco didn’t pause his keen observation of the magpies’ strife. It was Friday after all, and Auror Appleworm made always her appearence on that day at the time of her best convenience.

“I would have prepared lunch for us both, had you come half an hour earlier”, said Draco as he rose and put the book aside, still looking out the window.

“Thank you Malfoy, I’ve already eaten”.

Malfoy startled at the male voice, and then startled again when he realised who it belonged to. He turned slowly, disbelieving, his aristocratic training supplying a small surge of nonchalance thanks to which he managed to pocket his hands and look calm.

“Excuse my surprise, I was expecting Mrs Appleworm, as usual. To what do I owe the pleasure, Potter?”

Harry remained near the door, politely waiting for an invitation to sit. His auror robes were impeccable, their maroon bringing back to Draco’s memory their quidditch matches.

“Mrs Appleworm’s daughter went in labor this early morning. She is going to take some months away, although we are trying to convince her to retire and enjoy her grandchildren. Septuplets”, he added at Draco’s curious expression.

“Oh, my. I thought she wasn’t due until next month. I trust they are all healthy and well”

Harry nodded, “I paid a visit on my way here. They are all well and Agnes and Mr Appleworm are over the moon”.

“I’ll have to remember to send them a present”.

An awkward silence settled between them while Draco reigned his nerves and Harry looked around the room, taking in the elaborate shelf-cases, the light upholstery and drapes, and the yellow wallpaper. It was nothing as he remembered the Manor.

“I made some changes”, offered Draco, guessing Harry’s train of thought. “Now that I am the only inhabitant I figured I could make this house, eh, more welcoming. Please, do sit down”, he finished gesturing towards the armchair next to his, by the other side of the window. “And please excuse my manners earlier, I was caught in two magpies fighting over a piece of apple in mid flight right outside the window”

Harry looked perplexed at that confession and a small smile graced his face while he approached the window. “They don’t look like fighting now”, he said as he spotted them through the window, resting atop of an ornamental stone cornucopia, grooming each other.

Draco followed Harry’s pointing finger and he couldn’t contain a delighted exclamation upon finding the two birds.

“They must have learnt to share, then. Now, what can I do for you, Auror Potter?”

They fell in a comfortable routine. Every Friday at precisely 2 o’clock, Harry appareted outside the reading room door and knocked before entering. Draco would put aside whatever book he had picked from the list the Ministry had provided as one of the conditions to keep him out of Azkaban and, after the compulsory questions and tests, they’d settle in an easy conversation that could go on until dinner time. Draco would always politely extend an invitation to stay and Harry would always politely refuse. They’d talk about quidditch, muggle culture —a big part of Draco’s assigned readings—, recent news, what were the Manor’s elfs up to…

Over time, more than seven years if he wasn’t mistaken, Draco had struck a sort of friendship with Mrs Appleworm. He had started to forgive himself for his acts of war and his past arrogance upon learning how she saw him. A veteran auror and elderly mother, when she looked at Draco Malfoy she saw an abused child never too rotten to mend. Draco might not think as benevolently about himself yet, but he was willing to get there someday, which was a huge step forward from the self-deprecating, self-harming depressive state Agnes Appleworm found him in. This days he barely indulged in regret and sadness and fear. He stayed firmly attached to calm and apathy.

After five weeks of Mrs Appleworm leave, eagerness joined those two main emotions. Draco found himself eager for Friday afternoon well early in the week, and Saturdays and Sundays were usually filled with a peaceful sensation akin to happiness. It felt good to face Potter once a week for a few hours. It gave his before and after a certain continuity. They never talked about school or the war, not even a passing mention, but the fact that Harry Potter existed, and acknowledged Draco’s existence, made all the memories and every movement away from them and past his prior ways, somehow more real.

That afternoon, however, Harry’s dark mood was all over the place, making it impossible for Draco not to ask if everything was alright.

“I’m sorry, it’s nothing important. I just had a tough session with my therapist last evening”, said Harry with an apologetic smile.

“A therapist? Like a muggle psychotherapist?”, Draco couldn’t refrain to ask, surprised as he was. Harry scoffed.

“A muggle psychotherapist, actually, yes”.

Draco made a very polite, very English face of understanding and promptly looked through the window in search of and urgent change of topic, for he could not possibly fathom a non-personal, prim and proper way to continue this conversation. Providence delivered in the form of two magpies landing on the windowsill.

"Oh!", softly exclaimed Draco, inexplicably delighted. "Would you look at that!"

"Are they the same two?"

"I couldn't tell…"

Both young men fell silent, watching the birds. They had landed side by side with a fraction of a second between them. They had looked around with that avian sort of movement that made most corvids look offended, and then started to skip all along the windowsill, apparently without purpose but very pointedly ignoring each other.

After a while, Draco could not take the ominous feeling that scene had sparked in him, and turned to Harry, who was still transfixed by the magpies' bizarre dance.

"Should I ask? About your therapy".

Harry smiled as if he had been expecting the question, and didn't say anything nor looked away from the birds for a little while.

"Why, Malfoy, what would you ask?", inquired Harry, finally looking at him with a placid expression, devoid of any hostility Draco might have anticipated. At this, Draco shrugged his shoulders almost imperceptibly and gave a spontaneous response that seemed to be aching to be spoken.

“What is it for. Although I can imagine. How is it going. Or whether it helps or not”. After a very brief pause he added: “How are you”.

Harry laughed softly, throwing his head backwards. He covered his face with his hands and sighed.

“I am fucked”, he declared meeting Draco’s gaze. “I’m a child soldier with PTSD, abandonment issues, identity issues and claustrophobia. I’m an abuse victim and have a deep distrust towards any authority figure. This, added to my natural tendency to bend rules results in ‘severe misanthropy and incapability to work within a hierarchy’”, he said, signing in the air the quotation marks before dropping his hands on his lap with mild frustration. “Every fatherly figure I ever had aside from Hagrid and Arthur Weasley is dead. All my friends are war heroes with similar issues, so we barely talk about normal stuff. So to avoid feeding each other’s neurosis we barely talk, full stop. My adopted family was so invested in actually making me one of them that they unconsciously pushed a relationship that ended up feeling unsettling close to incest and finished awkwardly and dramatically, distancing me from them. Oh, and right when a single month had passed without the press pestering me, tomorrow the Prophet is going to be all about me being queer because the guy I met at a muggle gay pub last Friday happened to be a squib, and he knew exactly who I was. So, uh, yeah. I’m fucked”.

Draco’s eyes were wide in shock and concern. He hadn’t known what to expect when he had enunciated the hypothetical questions he would make, but he was pretty sure he’d have been shook even if he had imagined the half of what Harry had just said.

“I am deeply sorry, Potter. I shouldn’t have brought the subject up”.

“I wouldn’t have told you if I hadn’t wanted to”.

“Nevertheless, it is none of my business”.

Harry scoffed, this time a tad irritated. When he spoke it was patent that he was trying to refrain from lashing out completely onto Malfoy:

“How is this not your business? My psychopathic tutors certainly aren’t, but all the rest? My parents’ death? Voldemort’s return? The war? You were a part of it ever since you were born!”. Draco only managed to mouth like a fish, watching as Harry grew more and more indignant. “You conspired and helped to set on the battle at Hogwarts. At a bloody school!”, he boomed now. “You put a cursed necklace on a student! You let the Deatheaters into the castle! You were a bloody little soldier just like I was!”.

Draco rose from his seat, trembling with rage and shame:

“I didn’t have a choice, Potter! I was born into it! I didn’t ask for any of it. I didn’t ask for this!”

From his armchair, Harry was looking up at him, at first with defiance. Upon hearing this, watching Draco looming over him, eyes wet and breathing deeply, his features softened.

“I know you didn’t ask for this. It was uncalled for. I am on edge since I knew about the Prophet, but that’s not an excuse. I am very sorry for yelling at you and bringing up the past. For the record, I think you’ve already done more than enough to repay your debts and change your ways”.

Draco was still staring, still looming, still breathing heavily and holding back his tears with all his power. He stood there for a few beats, and then he sat back down slowly, not taking his eyes off of Harry. A few moments of silence elongated between them, faces flustered, bodies tense, eyes locked. Finally, Draco relaxed into the backrest and spoke calmly:

“I never knew you were mistreated as a child. It’s an abomination”.

“I never knew you would be learning about muggle culture willingly”.

“It’s part of my sentence”.

“Hermione told me you wrote her like six feet of an apology letter and asked for books, music and films”, shot back Harry with a mischievous grin. Draco rolled his eyes, mocking annoyance:

“You can’t keep secrets anymore”.

“Not between Hermione, Ron and I, no”.

They smiled at each other with something warmer than the pleasant politeness that had grown between them during the past weeks. Harry broke eye contact first to look out the window. Draco kept looking at Harry, letting the list of his presumed flaws sink in. They both spoke at the same time:

“The magpies are gone”.

“Did they know?”.

Harry looked at him, seeming at loss.

“Sorry, who knew what?”.

“The new head of Muggle Relations and her husband. About you being queer”.

Harry avoided Draco’s eyes and bit his lower lip. “No they didn’t. If I don’t tell them today, they’ll find out tomorrow and they’ll be pissed I didn’t tell them. Luna Lovegood was the only one that knew besides my therapist. We had a one night stand some years ago. In the afterglow we were talking about this and that and I told her I liked guys. She said that people is people no matter what they pack, and love is love. Honestly we were high and I’m derailing. You’re the third person I tell this and I’m not getting any good at it”.

Draco smirked. He rested his elbow on the armrest and his face atop his open palm, his little finger tracing the corner of his smile.

“I used to think I was asexual. Many honorable wizards were by birth or choice. Something to do with amplifying magic with your ‘life drive’”. Harry stifled a laugh and Draco smiled wider. “I used to think I’d marry Pansy Parkinson, or Millicent Bullstrode or one of the Greengrasses, force myself to produce one single heir and dedicate my life to study potions and being a socialite. Then I saw Cedric Diggory on a broom”.

Harry gaped, completely pleased with this piece of gossip, and maybe also with the fact that he and Draco Malfoy were talking about Hogwarts and it was not a sensible topic.

“Cedric whispered in my ear that I should bath with one of the clues for the Triwizard Tournament and I still get the chills when I recall it”.

“He was stupidly handsome”, murmured Draco looking away, suddenly aware of the cause of Cedric’s death. “And stupidly brave. Like you”. He looked back at Harry just in time to notice he was flustered. He told himself it was because they’d been talking about Cedric.

“I have to go soon. I have owls to send”, stammered Harry standing up to take his cloak and leave. Draco stood to see him out.

By the door they stopped and looked at each other, not knowing exactly what to do. In the end Draco offered his hand and said:

“Thank you. For telling me all that. And acknowledging that I’ve changed. And volunteering to be my counselor. I know nobody else beside Agnes was willing to come here and not beating me up”.

Harry ignored Draco’s hand, his earnest look of gladness invading all of Draco’s range of sight. He pressed his lips together and dove for a hug. It was a tight, deliberate embrace, oozing sincerity and the true, deep affection that only likeness invokes. Draco wrapped his arms loosely around Harry, completely dazed by such gesture.

“Thanks to you”, whispered Harry on Draco’s ear. “For trying, getting there, and leveling me all the way up to here”. He stepped away and out the door, and a muted snap confirmed that he was gone until next Friday.

Draco stood there, the chills running through his spine.

#fictober19 #fictober day four #fictober day 4 #drarry #drarry fic #drarry fanfic #drarry fanfiction #drarry fandom #pre-slash drarry #pre-slash #ewe #epilogue what epilogue

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